Lung cancer remains one of the most frequently diagnosed cancers. It is also one of the deadliest cancers – with each year more than 1.6 million tumor-related deaths worldwide.

The correlation between smoking and mortality from lung cancer has been clearly confirmed and a decrease of mortality after cessation of tobacco use has been seen in the United States. Since the 1990s first in men and later, since the early 2000s also in women.

Although direct environmental exposure to tobacco smoke is the predominant risk factor, inhalation of cancer causing agents such as marijuana or hookah us also contributes to the risk of lung cancer.

Additional risk factors include exposure to radon, asbestos, diesel exhaust and ionizing radiation. Furthermore, the latest evidence suggests that there is a correlation between lung cancer and chronic obstructive lung disease that is independent of tobacco use and is most likely caused as a result of a genetic abnormality.

In this episode of The Onco'Zine Brief Peter Hofland and Sonia Portillo interview Fred R. Hirsch, MD, PhD, Chief Executive Officer of International Association for the Study of Lung Cancer (IASLC) and a professor at the University of Colorado School of Medicine.

They discuss new treatment options for patients with lung cancer.