What happened, in summary

This man was one of four patients with COPD and right lower lobe squamous cell lung cancer treated with sleeve right lower lobectomy. His pathologic stage was Stage II. He had not received treatment before surgery. The operation removed the right lower lobe and involved systematic lymph-node dissection, while a sleeve reconstruction preserved the right middle lobe rather than removing both lower and middle lobes. This approach was chosen to maintain as much functioning lung tissue as possible while still removing the cancer. The case series reported that postoperative lung function was better than had been predicted for a larger resection. No cancer recurrence was documented during 28 months of follow-up.