The risk factors of local recurrence and distant metastasis on pT1/T2N0 mid-low rectal cancer after total mesorectal excision

BACKGROUND: Radical resection is associated with good prognosis among patients with cT1/T2Nx rectal cancer. However, still some of the patients experienced cancer recurrence following radical resection. This study tried to identify the postoperative risk factors of local recurrence and distant metastasis separately. METHODS: This retrospective, single-center study comprised of 279 consecutive patients from Linkou branch of Chang Gung Memorial Hospital in 2005–2016 with rectal adenocarcinoma, pT1/T2N0M0 at distance from anal verge ≤ 8cm, who received curative radical resection. RESULTS: The study included 279 patients with pT1/pT2N0 mid-low rectal cancer with median follow-up of 73.5 months. Nineteen (6.8%) patients had disease recurrence in total. Nine (3.2%) of them had local recurrence, and fourteen (5.0%) of them had distant metastasis. Distal resection margin < 0.9 (cm) (hazard ratio = 4.9, p = 0.050) was the risk factor of local recurrence. Preoperative carcinoembryonic antigen (CEA) ≥ 5 ng/mL (hazard ratio = 9.3, p = 0.0003), lymph node yield (LNY) < 14 (hazard ratio = 5.0, p = 0.006), and distal resection margin < 1.4cm (hazard ratio = 4.0, p = 0.035) were the risk factors of distant metastasis. CONCLUSION: For patients with pT1/pT2N0 mid-low rectal cancer, current multidisciplinary treatment brings acceptable survival outcome. Insufficient distal resection margin attracted the awareness of risk factors for local recurrence and distant metastasis as a foundation for future research. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1186/s12957-021-02223-4.