Clinicopathological features and outcomes of 251 patients with esophageal cancer in the Eastern Anatolian Region of Turkey where upper gastrointestinal system tumors are endemic: Single-center data

Background: we aimed to report demographic features, tumor characteristics, and survival outcomes of the patients with esophageal cancer (ec) in the eastern anatolian region of turkey, where upper gastrointestinal tumors are endemic. materials and methods: our retrospective investigation was performed on patients with ec treated in erzurum regional training and research hospital clinics of medical and radiation oncology between 2005 and 2017. the patients with stage iia-iv disease and completed at least one treatment modality (surgery/ definitive chemoradiotherapy (crt)/palliative chemotherapy(ct) or radiotherapy(rt)) had enrolled in the study. the demographic and clinicopathological characteristics, tnm stage, oncological treatment modalities applied, and survival outcomes were statistically analyzed. results: our study consisted of 251(women, 57.4%) patients with ec with a female/ male ratio of 1.34/1. the median age of the patients was determined as 62 years. the primary tumor was frequently localized in the middle(46.6%) and lower(46.2%) part of the esophagus, and the majority had squamous cell carcinoma histopathological subtype(86.1%). the median follow-up period and overall survival (os) time were 21.2 and 19.0 months, respectively. a five-year os rate was detected as 19.3%. as a result of multivariate analysis; grade, stage and concurrent crt were determined as independent prognostic factors (p=0.004, p=0.019, and p=0.014, respectively). the median os of stage ii-iii and iv patients were 25.79 versus 10.02 months (p<0.001). among stage ii-iii patients, the best median os was in the surgery+ adjuvan rt/crt group(37.02 months). in stage iv patients, the median os of female patients was found to be statistically significantly higher than that of males(15.77 versus 9.29 months p=0.007). conclusion: ec is a significant health problem in the eastern anatolian region of turkey. differences were detected according to age and gender, tumor characteristics, histological subtype, and disease stage rates in patients with ec living in this region, but the survival rate was similar with the literture. surgery+ adjuvant rt/crt provided better os in the non-metastatic patients than other treatment modalities.