clinicopathological profile of lung cancer patients in a teaching hospital in south india

introduction: lung cancer is one of the leading causes of cancer related deaths in the world. the incidence of lung cancer is increasing in india and there is a need to understand the natural history of this disease. aim of the study: to study the clinico- pathological- radiological profile of patients diagnosed with lung cancer from january 2013 to may 2015 at a tertiary care teaching hospital. materials and methods: inpatient records of all patients admitted during the study period were examined and  all patients with a histologically proven diagnosis of bronchogenic carcinoma were recruited. demographic characteristics, clinical, radiological and pathological details of each patient were recorded. results: fifty four patients with lung cancer were identified. forty three (79.6%) were male and 11 (20.4%) were female. thirty two (59.7%) were smokers and 22 (40.7%) were non smokers. cough and expectoration (61.1%) was the most common presenting symptom followed by breathlessness (59.3%). mass lesion (81.5%) was the most common radiological presentation and adenocarcinoma (42.6%) was the most common histological subtype. when compared to fiber optic bronchoscopy, image guided percutaneous biopsy had a better  yield for diagnosing lung cancer (51.9% vs 48.1%). but this difference was not statistically significant (p=0.892) conclusion: adenocarcinoma is replacing squamous cell carcinoma as the most common type of lung cancer in india.