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More Lymph Nodes Examined for Cancer at Specialty Centers |
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Latest Health News
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Examining but a few may affect treatment and Prognosis, research says A U.S study reports that Stomach or pancreatic Cancer patients may have undergone examination of more Lymph nodes if they have had their therapy at designated cancer facilities or at hospitals that conduct a lot of surgeries for cancer.
Present guidelines for stomach and pancreatic cancers advise that at least 15 regional lymph nodes be examined in patients suffering from these diseases. Background information provided by the study revealed that examining too few lymph nodes for the presence of cancer cells may result in cancer misclassification that can modify prognosis, treatment choices and the patient’s eligibility to be enrolled in certain Clinical trials.
The records of 3,088 patients with stomach cancer and 1,130 pancreatic cancer patients from the National Cancer Database were analyzed by the research team. Of the total patients with stomach cancer, 11.6 percent had been surgically treated at a National Cancer Institute-accredited medical center or at a hospital belonging to the National Comprehensive Cancer Network (NCCN-NCI medical centers), 34 percent had been surgically treated at other academic medical centers (medical school-affiliated hospitals, but non-NCCN-NCI facilities) and 54.4 percent had undergone surgical operation at community hospitals.
Of those suffering from pancreatic cancer, 19 percent had been surgically treated at NCCN-NCI hospitals, 43.3 percent at other academic medical centers, and those who had been operated at community hospitals comprised the remaining 37.7 percent.
Together with his colleagues, Dr. Karl Bilimoria of the American College of Surgeons and Feinberg School of Medicine at Northwestern University in Chicago wrote, "Patients undergoing surgery had more lymph nodes examined at NCCN-NCI hospitals than at community hospitals [median [midpoint], 12 vs. six for gastric cancer and nine vs. six for pancreatic cancer. Patients at the highest-volume hospital had more lymph nodes examined than patients at low-volume hospitals [median, 10 vs. six for gastric cancer and eight vs. six for pancreatic cancer]."
In general, the study said that patients who had undergone examination of at least 15 regional lymph nodes composed of 23.2 percent for stomach cancer and 16.4 percent for pancreatic cancer. The odds for patients to have at least 15 lymph node examinations were greater for those at NCCN-NCI designated medical centers than for those at community or low-volume hospitals.
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