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. 2017 Jun 3;8(9):1665-1672.
doi: 10.7150/jca.19197. eCollection 2017.

Evaluation of 7th Edition of AJCC Staging System for Nasopharyngeal Carcinoma

YuFeng Ren  1 , Huizhi Qiu  2 , Yujie Yuan  3 , Jinning Ye  3 , Yunhong Tian  2 , Bixiu Wen  1 , Weijun Zhang  2 , Qun Li  4   5
Affiliations

Evaluation of 7th Edition of AJCC Staging System for Nasopharyngeal Carcinoma

YuFeng Ren et al. J Cancer. .

Abstract

Purpose: To evaluate and improve the 7th edition International Union against Cancer/American Joint Committee on Cancer staging system for nasopharyngeal carcinoma. Methods: A retrospective review of the data from 905 patients with biopsy-proven non-disseminated nasopharyngeal carcinoma was performed. All the patients were examined by magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and received radiotherapy. Results: Satisfied distributions among the stages were observed in the 7th edition staging systems. LRFS only differed in classifications betweenT1 and T3, T1 and T4 (P=0.022 and P=0.016, respectively). Significant differences were observed between patients without and with masticator space involvement for OS, DMFS and PFS (p<0.05). No statistically significant differences in LRFS were observed among different groups with anatomical masticator space involvement. The DMFS between N2 and N3b, N3a and N3b were lack of significance (P=0.060 and P=0.59). The T category and N category were independent prognostic factors for the major endpoints in the Cox multivariate regression analysis (P<0.01). Conclusion: This study confirmed the prognostic value of the 7th edition UICC/AJCC staging system, the revisions of the 7th edition staging system are acceptable. However, our study also revealed limitations in the current staging system and suggested some potential modifications in future revision.

Keywords: American Joint Committee on Cancer; Nasopharyngeal carcinoma; Staging system; prognosis..

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Conflict of interest statement

Competing Interests: The authors have declared that no competing interest exists.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
(a) Overall survival and (b)Local relapse-free survival by T-category in 905 non-disseminated patients
Figure 2
Figure 2
(a)Overall survival and (b)distant metastasis-free survival by N-category in 905 non-disseminated patients
Figure 3
Figure 3
(a) Overall survival and (b)disease-free survival by stage groups in 905 non-disseminated patients
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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