Prognostic Significance of Pretreatment Staging With (18)F-FDG PET in Esophageal Cancer: A Nationwide Population-Based Study

Without the routine use of (18)F-FDG PET for initial staging of esophageal cancer, it may lead to inaccurate staging and suboptimal treatment. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the prognostic significance of pretreatment (18)F-FDG PET in nonmetastatic esophageal cancer by comparing the survival between patients with and without pretreatment PET. MATERIALS AND METHODS: We selected newly diagnosed esophageal cancer patients without metastasis between 2009 and 2015 from Taiwan Cancer Registry and National Health Insurance Research Database. Pretreatment (18)F-FDG PET staging was determined according to the implementation of PET within 90 days before starting treatment. Overall survival was calculated from the day of treatment initiation to the death from any cause. Survival curves were compared between patients with and without PET staging using the log-rank test. RESULTS: Of the 9078 patients included, 1765 (19.4%) and 7313 (80.6%) patients were staged with and without pretreatment PET, respectively. The median follow-up time for all patients and survivors was 1.29 years and 5.46 years, respectively. The pretreatment PET group had a lower risk of death than the no pretreatment PET group (hazards ratio, 0.74; 95% confidence interval, 0.70–0.79; P < 0.001). After adjusting for age, stage, histology, and tumor location, pretreatment PET remained significantly correlated with a lower risk of death (hazards ratio, 0.78; 95% confidence interval, 0.73–0.83; P < 0.001). CONCLUSIONS: The utilization of pretreatment (18)F-FDG PET for staging in nonmetastatic esophageal malignancy is associated with a lower risk of death even after adjusting for age, stage, histology, and tumor location.