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The following is a summary of “Sex-based differences in lung cancer susceptibility and molecular genetics in the 2020s,” published in the January 2025 issue of Pulmonology by Mosleh et al.
Sex-based differences in histological subtypes, mutation frequencies, and treatment responses in lung cancer have been widely studied, though recent evidence remains limited and controversial.
Researchers conducted a retrospective study to explore sex-based differences in patients with lung cancer during the era of immunotherapy and molecularly targeted agents.
They assessed 286 patients with lung cancer (female: male ratio 134:152/47%:53%) diagnosed between 2020 and 2022 at the pulmonology department of the Medical University of Vienna, Austria. Demographic data, histological subtypes, PD-L1 expression on tumor cells, mutation status, treatment approaches, and survival outcomes were compared between male and female patients.
The results showed that female patients with lung cancer had a significantly lower smoking rate than males (P = 0.005). Targetable mutations were more prevalent in females (52% vs 30%, P = 0.011). No significant differences were found in age at diagnosis, body mass index, lung function, histological subtypes, PD-L1 protein expression, disease stage, or survival between male and female patients (all P > 0.05).
Investigators concluded that female Caucasian patients appeared to have a higher susceptibility to lung cancer, potentially due to a higher prevalence of actionable driver mutations, despite similar overall rates of genetic alterations between sexes.
Source: cell.com/heliyon/fulltext/S2405-8440(25)00469-4
