Is prophylactic cranial irradiation indicated for patients with extensive-stage small cell lung cancer with a complete response to first-line treatment?

Prophylactic cranial irradiation (PCI) has been considered standard of care for patients with limited-stage small-cell lung cancer who achieve complete response to definitive treatment after a meta-analysis revealed its favorable effects on survival. In a European trial, PCI was also shown to confer a survival advantage for patients with extensive-stage (ES) SCLC who experienced any positive response after initial chemotherapy, leading to PCI also being considered a standard treatment for these patients as well. However, a recent Japanese trial investigating PCI for patients with ES-SCLC was stopped early when an interim analysis failed to confirm a survival benefit. This finding has motivated the thoracic oncology community to rethink the role of PCI in ES-SCLC.