Surgery alone or combined with radiation therapy in esophageal carcinoma

Two patient-materials with esophageal carcinoma are analyzed: a group of 22 patients who, during the period 1971-1974, were treated with esophageal resection followed by esophagogastrostomy or colonic interpolation; a second group of 28 patients from 1975-1978, who were treated in the same way, but also given either preoperative or postoperative radiation therapy, or both. Surgical mortality was about the same in the two groups: 25-32%. The group given radiation therapy had a one-year survival rate of 50%, as compared with 23% in the group treated solely with surgery. All 24 patients given combined therapy, with all or part of the absorbed dose of 24-47 Gy given preoperatively, showed vital cancer in resected specimens. Vital cancer was found in the periesophageal nodes in only six patients (25%), however; patients given no preoperative radiation therapy had tumor in 20 of 26 cases (77%; P less than 0.01). Celiac nodes were resected at laparotomy; when malignancy was found, the celiac region was irradiated postoperatively. This finding does not appear to exclude long-term survival, as two patients with metastases to the celiac nodes at operation are alive 16 and 20.5 months following surgery. Simple compared to troublesome dissection gives a better rate of survival. The spleen was unintentionally injured in 21 patients at laparotomy and had to be removed. One-year survival was better in patients with intact spleen, especially in those who also had radiation therapy. Patients with resected spleen succumbed from metastases more often than from mediastinal recurrence, as compared with the patients with intact spleen.