"Maintenance" therapy means providing some sort of treatment that keeps your type of cancer cells from returning, or from increasing, and it's at a much lower dose and less frequent than acute therapy. Here's a definition from the NIH patient education website:

maintenance therapy (MAYN-teh-nunts THAYR-uh-pee)

Treatment that is given to help keep cancer from coming back after it has disappeared following the initial therapy. It may include treatment with drugs, vaccines, or antibodies that kill cancer cells, and it may be given for a long time.
http://www.cancer.gov/dictionary/?CdrID=45768

I also found a link to information, posted just this past July, that specifically addresses maintenance therapy with lung cancer. It's a blog about lung cancer by a physician. Hopefully it will answer the kinds of questions you have, and perhaps give you some points that you will want to clarify with your doctors.
http://lungcancer.about.com/b/2009/07/07/maintenance-therapy...

Good luck!!


sheila