Surgical treatment for early esophageal squamous cell carcinoma

Prognostic factors for patients with pathologic T1-T2N+ esophageal squamous cell carcinoma: A retrospective study with external validation

BACKGROUND

Lymph node metastasis is significantly associated with a worse prognosis in patients with localized early-stage esophageal squamous cell carcinoma. This study aimed to explore the prognostic factors and develop a nomogram for predicting survival in patients with pathologic T1-2N+ esophageal squamous cell carcinoma.

METHODS

Between 2014 and 2022, patients with pT1-2N+ esophageal squamous cell carcinoma who underwent esophagectomy with lymphadenectomy at 2 institutes were reviewed and assigned to training and external validation cohorts. Independent prognostic factors were identified via univariate and multivariate Cox regression analyses. The nomogram model was developed and evaluated by the area under the receiver operating characteristic curve and calibration curve.

RESULTS

In total, 268 patients with a median age of 65 years (range, 40-82) were included and assigned to training (n = 190) and external validation (n = 78) cohorts. The Cox proportional hazards model demonstrated that body mass index (P = .031), surgical approach (P < .001), T stage (P = .015), and Clavien-Dindo classification (P < .001) were independent prognostic factors in the training cohort. The nomogram showed good discrimination, with an area under the receiver operating characteristic curve for 1-year, 3-year, and 5-year of 0.810, 0.789, and 0.809 in the training cohort and 0.782, 0.679, and 0.698 in the validation cohort. The calibration curve showed that the predicted survival probability was in good agreement with the actual survival probability.

CONCLUSION

Lower body mass index, left surgical approach, T2 stage, and Clavien-Dindo classification grade III to V were related to worse prognosis in patients with pT1-T2N+ esophageal squamous cell carcinoma. The developed nomogram may predict individual survival accurately.

Long-term effect of hospital volume on the postoperative prognosis of 158,618 patients with esophageal squamous cell carcinoma in China

Background

The impact of hospital volume on the long-term survival of esophageal squamous cell carcinoma (ESCC) has not been well assessed in China, especially for stage I-III stage ESCC. We performed a large sample size study to assess the relationships between hospital volume and the effectiveness of ESCC treatment and the hospital volume value at the lowest risk of all-cause mortality after esophagectomy in China.

Aim

To investigate the prognostic value of hospital volume for assessing postoperative long-term survival of ESCC patients in China.

Methods

The date of 158,618 patients with ESCC were collected from a database (1973-2020) established by the State Key Laboratory for Esophageal Cancer Prevention and Treatment, the database includes 500,000 patients with detailed clinical information of pathological diagnosis and staging, treatment approaches and survival follow-up for esophageal and gastric cardia cancers. Intergroup comparisons of patient and treatment characteristics were conducted with the X² test and analysis of variance. The Kaplan-Meier method with the log-rank test was used to draw the survival curves for the variables tested. A Multivariate Cox proportional hazards regression model was used to analyze the independent prognostic factors for overall survival. The relationship between hospital volume and all-cause mortality was assessed using restricted cubic splines from Cox proportional hazards models. The primary outcome was all-cause mortality.

Results

In both 1973-1996 and 1997-2020, patients with stage I-III stage ESCC who underwent surgery in high volume hospitals had better survival than those who underwent surgery in low volume hospitals (both P<0.05). And high volume hospital was an independent factor for better prognosis in ESCC patients. The relationship between hospital volume and the risk of all-cause mortality was half-U-shaped, but overall, hospital volume was a protective factor for esophageal cancer patients after surgery (HR<1). The concentration of hospital volume associated with the lowest risk of all-cause mortality was 1027 cases/year in the overall enrolled patients.

Conclusion

Hospital volume can be used as an indicator to predict the postoperative survival of ESCC patients. Our results suggest that the centralized management of esophageal cancer surgery is meaningful to improve the survival of ESCC patients in China, but the hospital volume should preferably not be higher than 1027 cases/year.

Core tip

Hospital volume is considered to be a prognostic factor for many complex diseases. However, the impact of hospital volume on long-term survival after esophagectomy has not been well evaluated in China. Based on a large sample size of 158,618 ESCC patients in China spanning 47 years (1973-2020), We found that hospital volume can be used as a predictor of postoperative survival in patients with ESCC, and identified hospital volume thresholds with the lowest risk of death from all causes. This may provide an important basis for patients to choose hospitals and have a significant impact on the centralized management of hospital surgery.

Comparison of Ivor Lewis and Sweet esophagectomy for middle and lower esophageal squamous cell carcinoma: A systematic review and pooled analysis

BACKGROUND

Lack of robust evidence highlights the important need to address the controversy on the clinical safety and effectiveness between Ivor Lewis versus Sweet procedure for middle and lower esophageal squamous cell carcinoma (ESCC).

METHODS

Search results were filtered according to certain criteria and were analyzed in line with Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses guidelines.

FINDINGS

The inter-study heterogeneity was high. Ivor Lewis procedure might be associated with longer operation time (p < 0.01) and higher lymph node yield (p < 0.01) compared with Sweet procedure. There was no significant difference in the length of hospital stay and postoperative complications with similar reoperation rate between the two procedures (p > 0.05). As the combined analysis of survival data revealed, there was no statistical difference in the oncologic efficacy of them (p = 0.97).

INTERPRETATION

The present study based on retrospective data with high heterogeneity indicated that Ivor Lewis esophagectomy might be associated with increased lymph node yield but longer operation time than Sweet. Prospective studies are warranted to compare the long-term survival of Ivor Lewis esophagectomy versus Sweet for middle and lower ESCC.

Modeling the Cost-effectiveness of Esophageal Cancer Screening in China

BACKGROUND

This study aimed to examine the cost-effectiveness of one-time standard endoscopic screening with Lugol's iodine staining for esophageal cancer (EC) in China.

METHODS

A Markov decision analysis model with eleven states was built. Individuals aged 40 to 69 years were classified into six age groups in five-year intervals. Three different strategies were adopted for each cohort: (1) no screening; (2) one-time endoscopic screening with Lugol's iodine staining with an annual follow-up for low-grade intraepithelial neoplasia (LGIN); and (3) one-time endoscopic screening with Lugol's iodine staining without follow-up. Quality-adjusted life-years (QALYs) indicated the effectiveness of the model. The incremental cost-effectiveness ratio (ICER) was used as the evaluation indicator. Sensitivity analysis was performed to assess the robustness of the model.

RESULTS

One-time screening with follow-up was the undominated strategy for individuals aged 40-44 and 45-49 years, which saved USD 10,942.57 and USD 6611.73 per QALY gained compared to nonscreening strategy. For those aged 50-69 years, the nonscreening scenarios were undominated. One-time screening without follow-up was the extended dominated strategy. Compared to screening strategies without follow-up, all the screening strategies with follow-up were more cost-effective, with the ICER increasing from 299.57 USD/QALY for individuals aged 40-44 years to 1617.72 USD/QALY for individuals aged 65-69 years. Probabilistic sensitivity analysis (PSA) supported the results of the base case analysis.

CONCLUSIONS

One-time EC screening with follow-up targeting individuals aged 40-49 years was the most cost-effective strategy.

Comparison of Ivor Lewis esophagectomy and Sweet esophagectomy for the treatment of middle-lower esophageal squamous cell carcinoma

Background

For cancer of the middle and/or lower segment of thoracic esophagus, the Ivor Lewis esophagectomy is the mainstream standard surgery, whereas the Sweet procedure is widely used in China. As no consensus has been reached about the choice of different thoracic approaches, we designed this retrospective study to investigate and compare oncological benefits of the two surgical approaches.

Methods

After propensity score matching, 150 patients who underwent the Sweet or Ivor Lewis esophagectomy from August 2003 to December 2009 in the Beijing Cancer Hospital were reviewed. We compared the postoperative recovery, nutritional parameters, and survival of the two different surgical approaches.

Results

The 5-year overall survival (OS) rate for the whole group was 48.5%, and the 10-year OS rate was 35.6%. The Ivor Lewis group had a longer operation time, longer duration of chest tube drainage, and a larger volume of total thoracic drainage. No significant differences were found between the two groups in terms of the duration of systemic inflammatory response syndrome (SIRS), length of postoperative hospital stay, duration of postoperative nasogastric tube use, incidence of major complications, and nutritional status after the esophagectomy. The OS rates were similar in both groups.

Conclusions

The Sweet and Ivor Lewis esophagectomy are both safe and effective. A change of the surgical incision may not be the best way to increase survival, and the choice of surgical procedure should depend on the preference of the thoracic surgeon to secure the safety of the operation.

Expression and function of tetraspanin 1 in esophageal carcinoma

The present study explored the expression of tetraspanin 1 (TSPAN1) in esophageal carcinoma (EC) and its association with clinicopathological factors. TSPAN1 small interfering RNA (siRNA) was designed to target the TSPAN1 gene in Eca-109 cells in order to explore the biological function of TSPAN1 in the proliferation and apoptosis of EC. The results demonstrated that the level of TSPAN1 expression in EC tissue was significantly increased compared with that in adjacent normal tissue (P<0.001). TSPAN1 expression was also associated with histological differentiation, depth of invasion, lymph node metastasis (all P<0.05) and Ki-67 (P<0.01). However, no association was observed between TSPAN expression and gender, age or location (P>0.05). In addition, silencing TSPAN1 markedly inhibited proliferation while increasing the apoptosis rate of Eca-109 cells, which was demonstrated by detecting the expression of the cell proliferation-associated gene Ki-67 and the apoptotic gene caspase-3 (P<0.05). Taken together, these results indicated that TSPAN1 functions as a tumor-associated gene in EC through promoting cell proliferation and suppressing apoptosis, and siRNA technology may provide an advanced alternative in the development of therapeutics for EC.

Association between positive murine double minute 2 expression and clinicopathological characteristics of esophageal squamous cell carcinoma: a meta-analysis

The correlations of murine double minute 2 (MDM2) T309G and esophageal cancer were elucidated because the association between MDM2 expression states and clinicopathological parameters of esophageal squamous cell carcinoma (ESCC) is controversial. We conducted a meta-analysis on studies screened from PubMed, Web of Science, Embase, the Cochrane Library, and the Chinese Biomedical Literature Databases that were published before October 2014. All studies describing the association between MDM2 and ESCC were traced. Meta-analysis was performed using the STATA software (Stata Corp., College Station, TX, USA). A total of 9 studies with 707 cases and 324 controls were included. MDM2 expression was higher in ESCC than in normal esophageal epithelium (odds ratio [OR] 10.38, 95% confidence interval [CI] 6.42-16.78, P < 0.001). High MDM2 expression was associated with early primary tumor stage (T1/T2 vs. T3/T4, OR 0.59, 95% CI 0.38-0.92, P = 0.018) and increased risk of regional lymph node metastasis (N0 vs. N1, OR 1.66, 95% CI 1.03-2.67, P = 0.039). However, no relationship was observed between MDM2 expression and the risk of distant metastasis (OR = 2.09, 95% CI 1.00-4.36, P = 0.050), and MDM2 was not significantly correlated with TP53 expression (OR 1.22, 95% CI 0.53-2.77, P = 0.643). Our analysis suggests that MDM2 acts as a potent marker of early primary tumor stage but higher risk of regional lymph node metastasis in ESCC. However, because of the limited number of studies included, the result should be further clarified by well-designed prospective studies.

Evaluation of safety profile of thoracoscopic esophagectomy for T1bN0M0 cancer using data from JCOG0502: a prospective multicenter study

BACKGROUND

Thoracoscopic esophagectomy is rapidly and increasingly being used worldwide because it is a less invasive alternative to open esophagectomy. However, few prospective multicenter studies have evaluated its safety profile. This study aimed to evaluate the safety profile of thoracoscopic esophagectomy using perioperative data from the Japan Clinical Oncology Group Study (JCOG0502).

METHODS

JCOG0502 is a four-arm prospective study comparing esophagectomy with chemoradiotherapy for esophageal cancer, with randomized and patient preference arms. Patients with clinical stage T1bN0M0 esophageal cancer were enrolled until patient accrual was completed. Open or thoracoscopic esophagectomy was selected at the surgeon's discretion. Perioperative complications were defined as adverse events of ≥grade 2 as per Common Terminology Criteria for Adverse Events ver. 3.0.

RESULTS

A total of 379 patients were enrolled between December 2006 and February 2013. Of the 210 patients who underwent surgery, 109 patients underwent open esophagectomy, and 101 patients underwent thoracoscopic esophagectomy. Although thoracoscopic esophagectomy decreased the incidence of postoperative atelectasis (open: 22.0%, thoracoscopy: 10.9%; P = 0.041), reoperation was more frequent in the thoracoscopy group (open: 1.8%, thoracoscopy: 9.9%; P = 0.016). The incidence of overall complications did not differ between the two groups (open: 44.0%, thoracoscopy: 44.6%; P = 1.00). There was one in-hospital death in each group (open: 0.9%, thoracoscopy: 1.0 %; P = 1.00).

CONCLUSIONS

Thoracoscopic esophagectomy is a safe procedure with morbidity and mortality comparable with those of open esophagectomy. However, it is associated with a higher frequency of reoperation.

Influence of autologous and homologous blood transfusion on interleukins and tumor necrosis factor-α in peri-operative patients with esophageal cancer

OBJECTIVE

To explore the influence of different ways of blood transfusion on the expression levels of interleukins (IL) and tumor necrosis factor-α (TNF-α) inperi-operative patients with esophageal cancer.

MATERIALS AND METHODS

A total of 80 patients with esophageal cancer who underwent radical operations were selected as study patients and randomly divided into an observation group (treated with autologous blood transfusion) and control group (with homologous blood transfusion). Changes of intra-operative indexes and peri-operative blood indexes, from hemoglobin (Hb) and hematocrit value (Hct), to levels of inflammatory factors like interleukins-6 (IL-6), IL-8, IL-10 and tumor necrosis factor-α (TNF-α) were compared.

RESULTS

Operations for patients in both groups were successfully conducted, and no significant differences in mean surgical duration and intra-operative hemorrhage volume, fluid infusion volume and blood transfusion volume were detected (p>0.05). Compared with values before surgery, Hb and Hct levels decreased significantly while white blood cell count (WBC) increased 1, 5 and 7 d after operation (p<0.05, p<0.01). In addition, WBC was apparently higher in observation group than in control group 5 and 7 d after operation (p<0.01). Compared with before surgery, in the observation group, levels of IL-6, IL-8 and IL-10 had no significant differences after operation (P>0.05), but TNF-α level increased y (p<0.01), whereas in control group, IL-6 level had no significant difference (p>0.05), IL-8 level decreased obviously (p<0.05), IL-10 level increased markedly first and then decreased gradually as time passed but its level remained elevated (p<0.01), and TNF-α level increased first and then decreased, and there was no significant difference 7 d after operation (p>0.05).

CONCLUSIONS

Decreased IL-8 and increased IL-10 levels are two important reasons forimmunosuppression after homologous blood transfusion, whereas autologous blood transfusion can alleviate this while increasing the TNF-α level, which also has potential to improve anti-tumor immunity in the human body.

Effects of PLCE1 gene silencing by RNA interference on cell cycling and apoptosis in esophageal carcinoma cells

Esophageal squamous cell carcinoma (ESCC) is one of the most malignancies with a poor prognosis. The phospholipase C? gene (PLCE1) encodes a novel ras-related protein effector mediating the effects of R-Ras on the actin cytoskeleton and membrane protrusion. However, molecular mechanisms pertinent to ESCC are unclear. We therefore designed PLCE1-special small interfering RNA and transfected to esophageal squamous cell (EC) 9706 cells to investigate the effects of PLCE1 gene silencing on the cell cycle and apoptosis of ESCC and indicate its important role in the development of ESCC. Esophageal cancer tissue specimens and normal esophageal mucosa were obtained and assayed by immunohistochemical staining to confirm overexpression of PLCE1 in neoplasias. Fluorescence microscopy was used to examine transfection efficiency, while the result of PLCE1 silencing was examined by reverse transcription (RT-PCR). Flow cytometry and annexin V apoptosis assays were used to assess the cell cycle and apoptosis, respectively. Expression of cyclin D1 and caspase-3 was detected by Western-blotting. The level of PLCE1 protein in esophageal cancer tissue was significantly higher than that in normal tissue. After transfection, the expression of PLCE1 mRNA in EC 9706 was significantly reduced, compared with the control group. Furthermore, flow cytometry results suggested that the PLCE1 gene silencing arrested the cell cycle in the G0/G1 phase; apoptosis was significantly higher than in the negative control group and mock group. PLCE1 gene silencing by RNAi resulted in decreased expression of cyclin D1 and increased expression of caspase-3. Our study suggests that PLCE1 may be an oncogene and play an important role in esophageal carcinogenesis through regulating proteins which control cell cycling and apoptosis.

Endoscopic submucosal dissection versus endoscopic mucosal resection for the treatment of early esophageal carcinoma: a meta-analysis

Endoscopic submucosal dissection (ESD) was originally developed for en bloc resection of large, flat gastrointestinal lesions. Compared with endoscopic mucosal resection (EMR), ESD is considered to be more time consuming and have more complications for treatment of early esophageal carcinoma, such as bleeding, stenosis and perforation. The objective of this study was to compare the efficacy and safety of ESD and EMR for such lesions. We searched databases, such as PubMed, EMBASE, Cochrane Library and Science Citation Index updated to 2013 for related trials. In the meta-analysis, the main outcome measurements were the en bloc resection rate, the histologically resection rate and the local recurrence rate. We also compared the operation time and the incidences of procedure-related complications. Five trials were identified, and a total of 710 patients and 795 lesions were included. The en bloc and histologically complete resection rates were higher in the ESD group compared with the EMR group (odds ratio (OR) 27.3; 95% CI, 11.5-64.8; OR 18.4; 95% CI, 8.82-38.59). The local recurrence rate was lower in the ESD group (OR 0.13, 95 % CI 0.04-0.43). The meta-analysis also showed ESD was more time consuming, but did not increase the complication rate (P=0.76). The results implied that compared with EMR, ESD showed better en bloc and histologically resection rates, and lower local recurrence, without increasing the incidence of procedure-related complications in the treatment of early esophageal carcinoma.

Different expression of miRNAs in early esophageal squamous cell carcinoma with differential prognosis

Patients at the same pathological stage of early esophageal squamous cell carcinoma (ESCC) have significantly different prognoses. The aim of this study was to explore the relationship between specific microRNAs (miRNAs) in two groups of early ESCC patients who had different prognoses at the pT1N0 stage, and to study the prognostic significance of different miRNAs in early ESCC metastasis. We tried to identify prognostic markers that may be helpful in the selection of appropriate treatment for patients with early ESCC. We used TaqMan Human miRNA Arrays to detect and analyze bioinformatically the expression profiles of miRNAs in two groups, and the reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction method to verify the differences in miRNA expression. The miRNA arrays revealed a total of 29 markedly downregulated miRNAs in the survival group compared with the deceased group. Such miRNAs were associated with lympho-vascular invasion and metastasis, and acted as predictive markers of lympho-vascular invasion and metastasis. The detection of these miRNAs forms an important basis for the treatment of early ESCC. It can also help determine those patients with early ESCC who are good candidates for endoscopic resection treatment and those who need additional treatment after endoscopic resection.