Lung cancer is the most common cause of cancer-related death worldwide and in the United Kingdom (UK). In 2020, there were 51,983 adults in the UK diagnosed with lung cancer and 36,518 deaths. Many people think lung cancer is just due to smoking. However, at least one in ten people with lung cancer have never smoked. ‘Never-smokers’ are people who have smoked less than 100 tobacco cigarettes in their life. In fact, if we consider lung cancer in never-smokers (LCINS) separately, it is the seventh most common cause of cancer-related death.
If we can detect lung cancer earlier, we have a better chance of curing it and saving more lives.
Aim
My aim is to improve our ability to detect LCINS earlier.
Design and methods
I will not collect any new information from patients or make any changes to their usual care. Instead, I will mainly use information normally collected in electronic health records, but with personal identifiers removed (pseudo-anonymised data).
We know that LCINS is more common in certain groups (particularly women) in other countries. However, we have little information about the UK. I will look at UK cancer health records to see if factors like gender and ethnicity are related to LCINS.
I will use these factors to create a way to predict someone’s risk of getting LCINS in the next five years. I will use general practice (GP) health records. I will make sure this risk calculator works well for different groups of people.
At the end of this research, I will make sure we understand LCINS better. I will also be able to predict a person’s risk of having LCINS now or in the next five years. In the future, I want to develop and test ways to use the tools from my research to detect LCINS earlier. For example, I could see if we can use screening to diagnose people earlier while they have no symptoms.
Patients with LCINS have been involved throughout with group and one-to-one meetings and have helped improve my research plan. These patients have said it is important to share this research. For example, it will help healthcare workers and the public understand that never-smokers can still get lung cancer. I will share this research with doctors and scientists through presentations and scientific journals. We will use many ways to reach different people, such as charities and social media.
