The impact of age and performance status on the efficacy of osimertinib in patients with EGFR T790M-positive non-small cell lung cancer

The last decade has seen remarkable advances in the treatment of non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC), especially targeted therapy. Since the efficacy of gefitinib [the first-generation epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR)-tyrosine kinase inhibitor (TKI)] for patients with advanced lung adenocarcinoma was proven 10 years ago (1), many recent works have shown that EGFR-TKIs exhibit better treatment efficacies than platinum-based chemotherapy in patients with NSCLCs harboring EGFR mutations (2-4). However, although 1st or 2nd-generation EGFR-TKIs such as erlotinib, gefitinib, or afatinib are superior to conventional chemotherapy, disease progression and EGFR-TKI-resistance usually develop within 1–2 years of treatment (1-4).