Risk factors for lymph node metastasis in early colon cancer
You Jin Lee1, Jung Wook Huh2,3, Jung Kyong Shin4
1Department of Surgery, Good-Jang Hospital, Seoul, South Korea.
Background:
The aim of the study was to determine factors predicting lymph node metastasis in patients with T1 or T2 colon cancer.
Methods:
A total of 906 patients with T1 or T2 colon cancer who underwent colon resection with regional lymphadenectomy in a tertiary hospital, from January 2008 to December 2013, were analyzed. The prognostic factors for LN metastasis and the risk factors for survival were analyzed.
Results:
There were 728 patients (80.4%) without lymph node metastasis (LN-negative group) and 178 patients (19.6%) with lymph node metastasis (LN-positive group). Tumor invasion depth (P < 0.001), lymphatic invasion (P < 0.001), and perineural invasion (P = 0.008) were significantly different between the two groups. During the median follow-up period of 69 months, the 5-year disease-free survival rate was 98.6% for the LN-negative group and 92.8% for the LN-positive group (P ≤ 0.001). In multivariate analysis, influencing factors associated with disease-free survival rate were LN metastasis (P = 0.001) and perineural invasion (P = 0.040). Female, depth of tumor invasion (P = 0.001), and lymphatic invasion (P < 0.001) were significant independent predictive factors for lymph node metastasis in multivariate analysis.
Conclusion:
Positive LN status predicted poor disease-free survival in patients with early cancer. This suggests that depth of tumor invasion ≥ sm2 and the presence of lymphatic invasion in early colon cancer provide useful information to determine which patients would benefit from radical surgery.
