• Alkylating agent is a type of chemo drug that is capable of damaging the DNA of a cancer cell to ensure that the cell doesn’t make more copies of them.
• Topoisomerase inhibitor is a compound that can block the human enzymes that contributes to the growth of cancer cells.
• Antitumor antibiotic is an anticancer drug that is capable of slowing down or stop the growth of cancer cells.
• Antimetabolites is a chemo drug that is capable of interfering more than one enzyme that’s necessary for the growth of DNA inside the cancer cell.
• Mitotic inhibitor is a type of chemo drug that is capable of stopping the body from producing the protein which contributes to the cancer cell growth.
• Corticosteroids is man-made steroids used to help reduce the side effects of chemotherapy.

Surgery is typically used to treat localized lung cancer.
But lung surgery might not be appropriate for you if your cancer has metastasized or is very near any of the following structures:

• The heart
• The windpipe
• The food pipe (oesophagus)
• Major blood vessels
• Is man-made steroids used to help reduce the side effects of chemotherapy.

In these circumstances, your doctor might recommend other cancer treatments as an alternative of surgery, such as radiotherapy, chemotherapy or a combination of both, targeted therapy or immunotherapy.

Using drugs to kill cancer cells. It works by distressing the growth of cancer cells. Chemotherapy is the key treatment for small cell lung cancer. Doctors use it because:

• This type of cancer responds very well to chemotherapy
• Small cell lung cancer tends to have spread beyond the lung when it is diagnosed

Chemotherapy drugs circulate in the bloodstream around the body. Thus, chemotherapy can treat cells that have spread away from the lung tumour and spread to other parts of the body.

For lung cancer, targeted therapy works in a way that it disrupts the way cancers cells signal or interact with each other, causing them to stop growing and dividing. This treatment often has fewer side effects because they focus on targeting what is exactly wrong with the cancer cell, instead of killing normal, healthy cells too. For example, EGFR inhibitors, an oral medication, can be used alone without chemotherapy as the first treatment to block the signal from EGFR that tells the cells to grow for advanced non-small cell lung cancer with EGFR gene mutations. However, it is only suitable for patients with certain specific mutations found in the tumour.

Stereotactic Radiotherapy (SBRT/SRT) gives radiotherapy from many different angles around the body. The beams meet at the tumour, this means the tumour receives a high dose of radiation and the tissues around it receive a much lower dose. This lowers the risk of side effects. Stereotactic Radiotherapy (SBRT/SRT) is mainly used to treat smaller size tumour in lung, liver, lymph nodes, spinal cord and brain.

Immunotherapy stimulate the body’s immune system to recognize, attack and kill cancer cells. Immunotherapy may not be suggested for all patients, and responses to the treatment may vary widely. Immunotherapy may also be used in combination with other treatments such as radiotherapy or chemotherapy.

Stereotactic radiosurgery (SRS) is a non-surgical radiation therapy used to treat functional abnormalities and small tumours of the brain. It can deliver precisely-targeted radiation in fewer high-dose treatments than traditional therapy, which can help preserve healthy tissue.