title: Comparative study between two different staging systems (AJCC TNM VS BALLANTYNE'S) for mucosal melanomas of the Head & Neck.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Mucosal melanoma (MM) of head and neck (H&N) is a rare entity with a quite poor prognosis. Ballantyne's staging system has been commonly used since 1970. In the 7th edition of the AJCC Staging Manual a new chapter for the staging of TNM Classification system for mucosal melanoma (MM) of the head and neck (H&N) has been introduced to reflect the particularly aggressive biological behavior of this neoplasm. The aim of this study was to analyze and compare among Ballantyne's staging system vs TNM H&N in terms of overall survival (OS) and disease-free survival (DFS) in a consecutive population of patients with MM in a cancer centre.
  
  
  METHODS
  Descriptive analysis of demographic, clinical and pathological variables of MM of the Head & Neck were performed. We compared the survival curves for both systems according to the Kaplan-Meier method using the Log-rank test.
  
  
  RESULTS
  An up-staging migration effect from Ballantyne's localized disease to moderate-ly and very advanced disease according to AJCC staging system. The 5-year DFS and OS for Ballantyne's Localized Disease and AJCC Stage III were 31% and 36% vs. 47% and 50%, respectively. For locoregional disease the 5-year DFS / OS were 5% / 10% for Ballantyne's system vs. 13.8% / 17.8% and 0 / 0% for AJCC Stages IVA and IVB, respectively.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  In this series, the TNM staging system for MM of the H&N predicted the prognosis of the disease when comparing with Ballantyne's system.
authors.affiliation: Department of Head and Neck Surgery, Instituto Nacional de Cancerologia, Av. San Fernando # 22 Col. Seccion XVI,Tlalpan, Mexico D.F. 14080, kuauhyama@yahoo.com.mx.
authors.forename: K
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Luna-Ortiz
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Aguilar-Romero
authors.forename: V
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Villavicencio-Valencia
authors.forename: E
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Zepeda-Castilla
authors.forename: H
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Vidrio-Morgado
authors.forename: N
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Peteuil
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Mosqueda-Taylor
mesh_terms: D018572:Disease-Free Survival; D006258:Head and Neck Neoplasms / Q000473:pathology*; D006801:Humans; D008545:Melanoma / Q000473:pathology*; D009367:Neoplasm Staging; D011379:Prognosis; D012189:Retrospective Studies