Aggressive surgical resection does not improve survival in operable esophageal squamous cell carcinoma with N2-3 status.

World J Gastroenterol. 2015 Jul 28; 21(28):8644-52.WJ

RESULTS

With a median time from surgery to the last censoring date for the entire cohort of 72.2 mo, a total of 631 patients were still alive at the last follow-up and the median survival time was 35.5 mo. The surgical approach (left transthoracic vs Ivor-Lewis/tri-incisional) was verified as independent prognostic significance in patients with N0 or N1 status, but not in those with N2-3 status. Similar results were also observed with the number of resected LNs (≤ 14 vs ≥ 15). Compared with surgery alone, combined therapy achieved better outcomes in patients with N1 or N2-3 status, but not in those with N0 status. For those with N2-3 status, neither the surgical approach nor the number of resected LNs reached significance by univariate analysis, with unadjusted HRs of 0.826 (95%CI: 0.644-1.058) and 0.849 (95%CI: 0.668-1.078), respectively, and aggressiveness of surgery did not influence the outcome; the longest survival was observed in those patients who received the combined therapy.