Real-world implications of nonbiological factors with staging, prognosis and clinical management in colon cancer

Abstract

Background: The present study analyzed the nonbiological factors (NBFs) together with the American Joint Committee on Cancer (AJCC) Tumor-Node-Metastasis (TNM) staging system to generate a refined, risk-adapted stage for the clinical treatment of colon cancer. Methods: Eligible patients (N = 28,818) with colon cancer between 1 January 2010 and 31 December 2014, were identified from the Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results (SEER) database. Kaplan-Meier curves and Cox proportional hazards regression, analyzed the probabilities of cancer-specific survival (CSS) in patients with colon cancer, with different NBF-TNM stages. Results: Insurance status, marital status, and median household income were significant prognostic NBFs in the current study (p < 0.05). The concordance index of NBF-TNM stage was 0.857 (95% confidence interval (CI) = 0.8472–0.8668). Multivariate Cox analyses, indicated that NBF1-stage was independently associated with a 50.4% increased risk of cancer-specific mortality in colon cancer (p < 0.001), which increased to 77.1% in non-metastatic colon cancer. NBF0-stage improved in CSS as compared to the NBF1-stage in the respective stages (p < 0.05). Conclusions: The new proposed NBF-stage was an independent prognostic factor in colon cancer. Effect of NBFs on the survival of colon cancer necessitates further clinical attention. Moreover, the incorporation of NBF-stage into the AJCC TNM staging system is essential for prognostic prediction, and clinical guidance of adjuvant chemotherapy in stage II and III colon cancer.