Maintenance therapy in NSCLC

The current gold standard of care for first-line therapy in patients with nonsmall cell lung cancer (NSCLC) is a platinum-based doublet chemotherapy, which is recommended for a maximum of six cycles. Since the prolongation of the first-line regimen does not translate into improved survival, and most patients experience progression within 3–4 months after first-line therapy, new treatment strategies have been explored to delay disease progression and prolong survival. Maintenance therapy has been proposed as either continuation maintenance with one part of the induction treatment or as switch maintenance with a different agent not used in first-line therapy. There is an accumulating body of evidence that both strategies administered immediately after induction therapy could improve survival in patients with good performance status. In this review, recent results of pivotal studies are summarized, since some studies have shown impressive benefits in terms of survival and their strategy should be considered as a new treatment option in selected patients.