title: Surgery is an essential component of multimodality therapy for patients with locally advanced esophageal adenocarcinoma.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Experience with neoadjuvant chemoradiation (CXRT) has raised questions regarding the additional benefit of surgery after locally advanced esophageal adenocarcinoma patients achieve a clinical response to CXRT. We sought to quantify the value of surgery by comparing the overall (OS) and disease-free survival (DFS) of trimodality-eligible patients treated with definitive CXRT vs. CXRT followed by esophagectomy.
  
  
  METHODS
  We identified 143 clinical stage III esophageal adenocarcinoma patients that were eligible for trimodality therapy. All patients successfully completed neoadjuvant CXRT and were considered appropriate candidates for resection. Patients that were medically inoperable were excluded. Cox regression models were used to identify significant predictors of survival.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Among the 143 patients eligible for surgery after completing CXRT, 114 underwent resection and 29 did not. Poorly differentiated tumors (HR = 2.041, 95% CI = 1.235-3.373) and surgical resection (HR = 0.504, 95% CI = 0.283-0.899) were the only independent predictors of OS. Patients treated with surgery had a 50 and 54 % risk reduction in overall and cancer-specific mortality, respectively. Median OS (41.2 vs. 20.3 months, p = 0.012) and DFS (21.5 vs. 11.4 months, p = 0.007) were significantly improved with the addition of surgery compared to definitive CXRT.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Surgery provides a significant survival benefit to trimodality-eligible esophageal adenocarcinoma patients with locally advanced disease.
authors.affiliation: Department of Thoracic and Cardiovascular Surgery, The University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, TX, USA.
authors.forename: Caitlin C
authors.initials: CC
authors.lastname: Murphy
authors.forename: Arlene M
authors.initials: AM
authors.lastname: Correa
authors.forename: Jaffer A
authors.initials: JA
authors.lastname: Ajani
authors.forename: Ritsuko U
authors.initials: RU
authors.lastname: Komaki
authors.forename: James W
authors.initials: JW
authors.lastname: Welsh
authors.forename: Stephen G
authors.initials: SG
authors.lastname: Swisher
authors.forename: Wayne L
authors.initials: WL
authors.lastname: Hofstetter
mesh_terms: D000230:Adenocarcinoma / Q000556:secondary* / Q000628:therapy*; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D059186:Chemoradiotherapy, Adjuvant; D018572:Disease-Free Survival; D004938:Esophageal Neoplasms / Q000473:pathology* / Q000628:therapy*; D016629:Esophagectomy; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D053208:Kaplan-Meier Estimate; D008207:Lymphatic Metastasis; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D020360:Neoadjuvant Therapy; D060787:Neoplasm Grading; D016016:Proportional Hazards Models; D012189:Retrospective Studies