Pemetrexed Disodium With or Without Sorafenib as Second-Line Therapy in Treating Patients With Stage IIIB or Stage IV Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer

DISEASE CHARACTERISTICS:

• Histologically or cytologically confirmed non-squamous cell non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC)
• Stage IIIB or IV disease
• Squamous cell carcinomas are not allowed
• Adenosquamous histology allowed
• Measurable disease, defined as ≥ 1 lesion with longest diameter ≥ 2.0 cm by conventional techniques or ≥ 1.0 cm by spiral CT scan
• No nonmeasurable disease only, including small lesions and truly nonmeasurable lesions, including any of the following:
• Bone lesions
• Leptomeningeal disease
• Ascites
• Pleural/pericardial effusion
• Inflammatory breast disease
• Lymphangitis cutis/pulmonis
• Abdominal masses that are not confirmed and followed by imaging techniques
• Cystic lesions
• Previously treated with 1 chemotherapy regimen, including adjuvant treatment
• Prior treatment with adjuvant chemotherapy is allowed and not counted as a regimen
• Symptomatic pleural effusions should be drained prior to study entry
• No symptomatic serosal effusion (≥ CTCAE v3.0 grade 2 dyspnea) that is not amenable to drainage prior to study entry
• Stable brain metastasis allowed provided the following criteria are met:
• Treated with either whole brain radiotherapy or gamma knife surgery
• More than 4 weeks since prior steroids

PATIENT CHARACTERISTICS:

• ECOG performance status 0-1
• Life expectancy ≥ 12 weeks
• Absolute neutrophil count ≥ 1,500/mm³
• Platelet count ≥ 100,000/mm³
• Hemoglobin ≥ 9 g/dL
• Total bilirubin ≤ 1.5 times upper limit of normal (ULN) OR direct bilirubin normal
• Creatinine clearance ≥ 45 mL/min
• AST and ALT ≤ 3 times ULN (5 times ULN if liver has tumor involvement)
• INR 150 mm Hg and/or diastolic BP > 100 mm Hg, in spite of adequate antihypertensive therapy
• Angina pectoris
• Congestive heart failure within the past 3 months, unless LVEF > 40%
• Myocardial infarction within the past 6 months
• Cardiac arrhythmia
• Diabetes mellitus
• Active hemoptysis

PRIOR CONCURRENT THERAPY:

• See Disease Characteristics
• Recovered from all prior therapy, except for alopecia
• No prior sorafenib tosylate or pemetrexed disodium
• No prior therapy with agents that target VEGF, VEGF receptor, or VEGF receptor tyrosine kinase inhibitor (prior bevacizumab is allowed)
• Prior radiotherapy allowed if all the following criteria are met:
• No more than 25% of bone marrow was irradiated
• Measurable disease, whether there is in-field disease progression/recurrence or disease outside the treatment fields of radiation port, is present
• No acetylsalicylic acid dose of ≥ 1.3 grams/day for ≥ 10 days before and after completion of study treatment
• At least 4 weeks since prior full-field radiotherapy
• At least 2 weeks since prior limited-field radiotherapy
• At least 4 weeks since prior major surgery (i.e., laparotomy) or open biopsy
• At least 2 weeks since prior minor surgery
• At least 3 weeks since prior chemotherapy (6 weeks for mitomycin C and nitrosoureas)
• At least 2 weeks since prior immunotherapy, biologic therapy, or gene therapy
• At least 4 weeks prior hormonal therapy
• At least 4 weeks since other prior investigational agents
• No concurrent antiretroviral therapy
• No concurrent major surgery
• No concurrent steroids
• No concurrent therapeutic anticoagulation
• Concurrent prophylactic anticoagulation (i.e., low-dose warfarin) of venous or arterial access devices allowed provided requirements for PT, INR, or PTT are met
• No concurrent Hypericum perforatum (St. John's wort)
• No concurrent grapefruit or grapefruit juice
• No concurrent prophylactic use of colony-stimulating factors
• No other concurrent anticancer agents or therapies