[Clinicopathological characteristics and prognosis of young esophageal cancer patients].
OBJECTIVE
To compare the clinicopathological features and prognosis of esophageal cancer between young and elderly patients.


METHODS
Clinical data of 716 patients with esophageal squamous cell carcinoma undergoing curative operation from January 1990 to December 1998 at the Cancer Center of Sun Yat-sen University were analyzed retrospectively. Clinicopathological features and prognosis of 117 patients aged ≤45 years (young group) at diagnosis were compared with 599 patients aged >45 years (elderly group).


RESULTS
Except for tumor stage, there were no significant differences of clinicopathology between the young group and the elderly group (all P>0.05). There were more pathologic stage III cancer in the young group than the elderly group (47.9% vs. 33.6%, P=0.010). The 5-year survival rate (36.0% vs 33.8%) and 10-year survival rate (29.2% vs 25.0%) were not significantly different between the two groups (P=0.418). Multivariate analysis showed that the age was not the independent prognostic factors of esophageal squamous cell carcinoma (P=0.160, RR=1.187, 95%CI:0.935-1.506).


CONCLUSIONS
Young esophageal cancer patients have more advanced tumors than elderly patients. However, the survival is comparable to the elderly.
Department of Thoracic Oncology, Cancer Center, Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou 510060, China. cjzdk@126.com.
Dong-kun
DK
Zhang
Xiao-dong
XD
Su
Xu
X
Zhang
Lan-jun
LJ
Zhang
Yi
Y
Hu
Tie-hua
TH
Rong
D000328:Adult; D000367:Age Factors; D002294:Carcinoma, Squamous Cell / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000473:pathology* / Q000601:surgery; D004938:Esophageal Neoplasms / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000473:pathology* / Q000601:surgery; D000077277:Esophageal Squamous Cell Carcinoma; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D053208:Kaplan-Meier Estimate; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D011379:Prognosis; D016016:Proportional Hazards Models; D012189:Retrospective Studies