Climate impact of early-stage NSCLC treatment: A comparison between radiotherapy and surgery using Life Cycle Assessment

Introduction

Healthcare systems contribute significantly to CO₂ emissions, accounting for 7 % of emissions in the Netherlands. Understanding the environmental footprint of medical treatments can help identify opportunities for reducing climate impact. We evaluated the climate impact of stereotactic body radiotherapy (SBRT) and Video-Assisted Thoracic Surgery (VATS) when treating T1-2N0M0 Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer (NSCLC).

Materials and methods

We used life cycle assessment (LCA) to evaluate climate impact in emissions of kilograms of CO₂ equivalent. Care trajectories were inventoried for both VATS and SBRT with the same entry and end point of the paths. We analyzed a range of factors contributing to climate impact, such as patient and staff travel, energy consumption, disposables and medication using direct measurements: questionnaires and waste audits, or retrospective record analysis. As is common in LCA, existing infrastructure was excluded from the analysis. Reductions that can be influenced by individual departments were also modeled.

Results

Using LCA we calculated the impact of all categorized contributions for two treatments for NSCLC. In total, VATS generates approximately 547 kg CO₂ equivalent (CO₂e), whereas SBRT generates 172 kg CO₂e per treatment. For SBRT, the largest contributors were energy use in the hospital (52 % of total), of which 22 % is from the linac, and patient travel (23 %). For VATS, major contributions were hospital energy use (52 %) and disposables (23 %). Climate impact could be reduced by 20 % (SBRT) by hypofractionation, reduced linac idle time and patient travel impact, and 13 % (VATS) with fast track recovery and a reduction of disposables.

Conclusion

When treating T1-2N0M0 NSCLC, surgery has a larger climate impact than SBRT. For both modalities reductions are possible.