Advances in early-stage lung cancer patients: from preanalytics to molecular analysis

Lung Cancer (LC) remains one of the leading causes of cancer death worldwide. Molecular profiling of mandatory testing biomarkers significantly meliorates clinical outcome of advanced stage LC patients while intercepting early-stage lesions represents an unmet need. Recent advances in treatments for early-stage LC patients lay the basis for accelerating molecular analysis of actionable drivers before metastatic stages. In this scenario, liquid biopsy emerged as an innovative tool to guide clinical decision-making processes of early-stage LC patients. In addition, digital pathology is pioneering an integrative path to optimize morpho-molecular analysis. Undoubtedly, the lack of standardized preanalytical procedures significantly reduces the clinical availability of these approaches. This review aims to explore critical gaps affecting the clinical implementation of these approaches able to improve the clinical outcome of early-stage LC patients.