advice on how to catch earlier?
Eventually it will metastasize so some other part of the body and THAT will give symptoms.
When my Mum was diagnosed the Dr. said the bad news is you have cancer in the bones in your neck. The really bad news is that it started in your lungs, and it's way, way to far along to do anything about.
Cancer sucks.
We also have great non-invasive curative treatment options like stereotactic radiation.
It's fairly rare though, the quoted numbers from SEER are 14% but from a clinical perspective most of us that deal with lung cancer feel that's discordant with our practices and likely an overestimate.
In either case, smoker or non-smoker you're far more likely to develop NSCLC with adenocarcinoma being more common than squamous cell (typically only in smokers for the latter but still less common than adenocarcinoma).
The typical adenocarcinoma most people get has a doubling time of roughly 1-2 years.
I double checked, only 2.5% of SCLC incidences is from non-smokers.
Died on less than 2 months after that. It sucks.
My Mum was told that people with her diagnosis survive on average one year. She fought hard through radiation and years of chemo, and made it just less than three years after the diagnosis. Through most of it she was waking me up at 6am to go for a sunrise walk on the beach. I hope I can be that strong one day.
https://www.cdc.gov/cancer/lung/basic_info/screening.htm
https://www.uspreventiveservicestaskforce.org/uspstf/recomme...
Do you smoke? quit smoking. Do you live in areas with lots of air polution? High levels of radon where you live? Move.
Do you work with a bunch of carcinogenic chemicals? Find something else to do.
You can also get a gene test do see if you're suspectable to certain cancers.
But most importantly: listen to your body. If you feel that something is wrong, take it up with your doctor.
I’ve been told brake (or tire) dust is the newest suspect for why young never-smokers are developing lung cancer (combined with certain relatively prevalent mutations).
Outside of that, it’s a crap shoot. My mom in law didn’t have either risk factor. PET scans can pick up but each one exposes you to radiation which can also cause cancer. So they generally don’t screen for low risk patients.