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Non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) is the main histological subtype of lung cancer, which is the leading cause of cancer death. It is unclear whether the improved survival seen at high-volume centers applies to the general population and, more importantly, whether the improvement in lung cancer survival was just a consequence of improved screening work. Data from the Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results (SEER) registry was used to identify 405,580 patients with NSCLC diagnosed from 1988 to 2008. The patients were divided into four groups according to the year of diagnosis. Trends of clinical characteristics were analyzed to reflect the progress of screening work. Five-year relative survivals in various subgroups were compared. The results indicated that proportion of aged, advanced, and non-surgical patients increased, whereas patients with lymph node metastasis and high histology grade decreased. Improvements in all stages of NSCLC patients were demonstrated, with relatively more significant gains for patients with localized and regional disease. After potentially curative surgical resection, remarkable improvements were observed in both cohorts with time (surgical: 52.00%-63.00%; non-surgical: 6.10%-13.50%). Specifically, patients who underwent pneumonectomy, lobectomy/bilobectomy, and partial/wedge/segmental resection all presented better survival rates. Our SEER analysis demonstrated improvements among patients in all stages of NSCLC that were deemed attributable to improved therapy and medical care for NSCLC rather than improved screening work. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The association between polymorphic CAG repeats in the androgen receptor gene in women and breast cancer susceptibility has been studied extensively. However, the conclusions regarding this relationship remain conflicting. The purpose of this meta-analysis was to identify whether androgen receptor CAG repeat lengths were related to breast cancer susceptibility. The MEDLINE, PubMed, and EMBASE databases were searched through to December 2014 to identify eligible studies. Data and study quality were rigorously assessed by two investigators according to the Newcastle-Ottawa Quality Assessment Scale. The publication bias was assessed by the Begg's test. Seventeen eligible studies were included in this meta-analysis. The overall analysis suggested no association between CAG polymorphisms and breast cancer risk (odds ratio [OR] 1.031, 95% confidence interval [CI] 0.855-1.245). However, in the subgroup analysis, we observed that long CAG repeats significantly increased the risk of breast cancer in the Caucasian population (OR 1.447, 95% CI 1.089-1.992). Additionally, the risk was significantly increased in Caucasian women carrying two alleles with CAG repeats ?22 units compared with those with two shorter alleles (OR 1.315, 95% CI 1.014-1.707). These findings suggest that long CAG repeats increase the risk of breast cancer in Caucasian women. However, larger scale case-control studies are needed to validate our results. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]