Effects of a gemcitabine plus platinum regimen combined with a dendritic cell-cytokine induced killer immunotherapy on recurrence and survival rate of non-small cell lung cancer patients

The aim of the present study was to investigate the effects of a gemcitabine plus platinum (GP) regimen combined with dendritic cell-cytokine induced killer (DC‑CIK) immunotherapy on the recurrence and survival rate in patients with non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC). Patients (n=157) with stage Ⅲ NSCLC that had received surgery were randomly divided into a control group and an observation group. The control group was administered with a GP regimen and the observation group received GP chemotherapy that was based on DC‑CIK cell immunotherapy in addition to SC-CIK cell immunotherapy here. The two groups were followed up for 36 months and their postoperative cellular immune function, disease‑free survival time, cumulative recurrence rate and cumulative survival rate was analyzed. The percentages of CD3+CD4+ T lymphocytes, natural killer cells and the CD4/CD8 ratio were identified to be significantly increased following treatment compared with those observed prior to treatment in the control and observation groups; conversely, the CD3+CD8+ T lymphocyte percentage decreased significantly (P<0.05). Furthermore, the results of the patients in the observation group were significantly better compared with the control group based on these indicators (P<0.05). The median disease‑free survival time of patients in the observation group (28 months) was identified to be significantly longer than that of the control group (22 months; P<0.05), the three-year cumulative recurrence rate in the observation group (47.37%) was significantly lower than that of the control group (76.92%; P<0.05) and the three-year cumulative survival rate of the patients in the observation group (58.23%) was significantly higher than that of the control group patients (37.14%; P<0.05). In conclusion, the GP regimen combined with DC‑CIK immunotherapy significantly improved the immune cell function in the postoperative NSCLC patients, in addition to reducing postoperative tumor recurrence and prolonging the survival time of patients with NSCLC.