Background: The factors associated with the survival and prognosis of peritoneal cytology (CY)-positive pancreatic cancer patients who undergo curative resection followed by adjuvant chemotherapy have not been established.
Patients and methods: Both overall survival (OS) and recurrence-free survival (RFS) were examined in 23 peritoneal CY-positive pancreatic cancer patients who underwent curative resection followed by adjuvant chemotherapy between 2005 and 2015.
Results: When the length of OS was evaluated using a log-rank test, significant differences were observed in the number of metastatic lymph nodes. In addition, univariate and multivariate analyses demonstrated that the number of metastatic lymph nodes was a significant independent risk factor for OS and a marginally significant risk factor for RFS. The 3-year OS rate was 20.2% in patients with ≤8 metastatic lymph nodes, and it was 0% in those with the ≥9 metastatic lymph nodes (P = 0.017). The 3-year RFS rate was 6.3% in patients with ≤8 metastatic lymph nodes, whereas it was 0% in those with ≥9 metastatic lymph nodes (P = 0.062).
Conclusions: The number of metastatic lymph nodes is the most important prognostic factor for OS and RFS in peritoneal CY-positive pancreatic cancer patients who underwent curative resection followed by adjuvant chemotherapy. To improve the survival of these patients, it is necessary to establish optimal treatments.
Keywords: Adjuvant chemotherapy; pancreatic cancer; peritoneal cytology-positive.