Cancer Stages Lung

About cancer stages: lung cancer stages are used to separate the progression of lung cancer.

With cancer stages, lung cancer staging is a tool that doctors use to find out what to expect from your cancer. Doctors "stage" a lung cancer in order to track the cancer’s progress in the body.  This involves several tests, examinations and body scans in order to determine where, besides the lung, the cancer might be.

In other words, staging lung cancer helps doctors decide how to treat the cancer and lets them know how severe the problem is.

In cancer stages, lung cancer has four different stages.

Lung cancer is staged by number. There are stages 1-4 with some sub-stages in between.  Let’s take a look at the various lung cancer stages:

• Stage I. The cancer is generally small and located only within the lung tissue at one area.

  The lymph nodes are clear of cancer.  Stage 1A implies that the tumor is less than 3 centimeters in diameter, while stage 1B is between 3 and 5 centimeters in diameter.

• Stage 2. This stage is divided into sub-stages 2A and stage 2B.

  In stage 2A, you have a tumor between 5 and 7 centimeters in diameter or less than 5 centimeters in diameter that has shown evidence of local lymph node involvement.

  Stage 2B means that the tumor is greater than 7 centimeters and is localized within the lung
  or that it is between 5 and 7 centimeters in diameter but has spread to localized lymph nodes
  or to areas near the lung, such as the lung tissue lining,

  or that it has caused the lung to collapse

  or that there is more than one tumor in the same lung lobe.

• Stage 3. This stage is also divided into two stages.

  They are called stage 3A: when the lymph nodes involved are near the lung and the tumor in the lung is greater than 7 centimeters,
  or the tumor has spread to the wall inside of the chest or to the lymph nodes nearest to the heart,

  or has grown to involve some other organ inside the chest, such as the heart, esophagus (food pipe) or a major blood vessel

  or when more than one lobe of the lung has become affected and lymph nodes near the lung are also involved.

  Stage 3B means that the cancer is either in the opposite side of the chest

  or in a lymph node or nodes in the center of the chest, and a tumor is spotted elsewhere in the chest.

• Stage 4. This means that the tumor has spread to areas beyond the chest

  or is in both lungs

  or has caused cancerous fluid to build up in the chest.

The symptoms and treatments for lung cancer are different for each stage.

In looking at lung cancer stages, lung cancer will have different symptoms/ depending on the stage. In stage 1 lung cancer, for example, you may have no symptoms or you may have a cough, pain in the chest and the coughing up of bloody sputum.

In higher stages, you may have discomfort from swollen lymph nodes, you may have difficulty swallowing (if the esophagus is involved) or you may have shortness of breath from a collapsed lung or from fluid build-up in the lung cavity or in the heart cavity.

As the lung cancer progresses to later stages, there are more cancer cells around that use the nutrition you take in, causing you to lose more and more weight.

You may have a headache if the tumor has spread to the brain or severe bone pain if the tumor has spread to the bones.  Liver involvement can lead to jaundice (yellowing of the eyes and skin).

Doctors can tell you more about what symptoms to expect as you come to grips with having lung cancer. 

Written by Dr. Christine Traxler
July 2009
Reviewed by Susan McCracken
08-14-09