EGFR inhibitors as adjuvant therapy for resected non-small cell lung cancer harboring EGFR mutations

•Adjuvant EGFR-TKIs results in a longer DFS than adjuvant chemotherapy.•Less SAEs were observed in TKIs group than chemotherapy group.•The study paved the way for EGFR TKIs to be adjuvant treatment for NSCLC. Cisplatin-based chemotherapy as an adjuvant therapy for resected non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) has reached its plateau, and it is limited by a high risk of recurrence and significant toxicities. The clinical value of epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) tyrosine kinase inhibitors (TKIs) in resected NSCLC harboring EGFR mutations remains controversial. In this study, we performed a meta-analysis to evaluate the role of EGFR inhibitors as an adjuvant therapy for targeted patients. Studies were identified via electronic search. The pooled odds ratio (OR) for disease-free survival (DFS) and overall survival (OS) were calculated for the meta-analysis. There were 11 trials (1,152 resected NSCLC patients with EGFR sensitive mutations) in this meta-analysis. The results showed that adjuvant treatment with EGFR-TKIs can prolong both the OS and DFS when compared to treatment without TKIs as an adjuvant therapy (OS: OR, 0.63; 95% CI, 0.46 to 0.87, P = 0.004; heterogeneity I2 = 61%, P = 0.008; DFS: OR, 0.56; 95% CI, 0.43 to 0.72, P