title: Prognostic significance of vascular invasion in colorectal cancer of Dukes' B class.
abstract: To further characterize important prognostic factors in colorectal cancer of the Dukes' B class the pathologic material from 143 Dukes' B patients was reviewed for the presence of lymphatic and/or blood vessel invasion and correlated with the postoperative tumor-free interval and overall length of survival. In 27 patients with vascular invasion within the bowel wall, both the tumor-free interval and the overall survival time were not significantly different from the same parameters in 116 patients without vascular invasion (P = 0.28, P = 0.12 respectively). These data suggest that vascular invasion within the bowel wall per se is not an important prognostic factor among patients with colorectal cancer of the Dukes' B class.
mesh_terms: D001808:Blood Vessels / Q000473:pathology*; D003106:Colon / Q000098:blood supply; D003110:Colonic Neoplasms / Q000473:pathology*; D006801:Humans; D009361:Neoplasm Invasiveness; D011379:Prognosis; D012004:Rectal Neoplasms / Q000473:pathology*; D012007:Rectum / Q000098:blood supply