Table 1. Characteristics of patients with or without visible PALNs a .
| Characteristics (N = 3388) | Patients without visible PALNs | Patients with visible PALNs | P value | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| N = 2979 (%) | N = 409 (%) | ||||
| Age (years) | < 65 | 1075 (36.1) | 171 (41.8) | 0.014 | |
| ≥ 65 | 1904 (63.9) | 238 (58.2) | |||
| Gender | Male | 1878 (63.0) | 281 (68.7) | 0.014 | |
| Female | 1101 (37.0) | 128 (31.3) | |||
| Tumor Location | Colon | 2192 (73.6) | 301 (73.6) | 0.525 | |
| Rectum | 787 (26.4) | 108 (26.4) | |||
| Histological type | Adenocarcinoma | 2817 (94.6) | 286 (94.4) | 0.704 | |
| Mucinous adenocarcinoma | 115 (3.9) | 14 (3.4) | |||
| Signet ring cell adenocarcinoma | 40 (1.3) | 7 (1.7) | |||
| Carcinoma, NOS | 7 (0.2) | 2 (0.5) | |||
| Primary tumor | Lymphovascular invasion | Negative | 2645 (88.8) | 338 (82.6) | <0.001 |
| Positive | 334 (11.2) | 71 (17.4) | |||
| Perineural invasion | Negative | 2886 (96.9) | 393 (96.1) | 0.236 | |
| Positive | 93 (3.1) | 16 (3.9) | |||
| Grade b | Lower | 2734 (91.8) | 369 (90.2) | 0.166 | |
| High | 245 (8.2) | 40 (9.8) | |||
| Pathologic staging | pT | 1 | 435(14.6) | 28(6.8) | <0.001 |
| 2 | 462(15.5) | 50(12.2) | |||
| 3 | 1905(63.9) | 288(70.4) | |||
| 4 | 177(5.9) | 43(10.5) | |||
| pN | N0 | 1974 (66.3) | 220 (53.8) | <0.001 | |
| N+ | 1005 (33.7) | 189 (46.2) | |||
| Preoperative serum CEA level (ng/mL) | <10 | 2424 (85.3) | 322 (81.1) | 0.021 | |
| ≥10 | 419 (14.7) | 75 (18.9) | |||
| Data available | 2843 | 397 | |||
| 5-year overall survival | 76% | 67% | 0.015 | ||
aAll patients were diagnosed as having no distant metastases
bLower grade represents well or moderately differentiated histology and high grade represents poorly differentiated histology or mucinous carcinoma.
PALNs, para-aortic lymph nodes; CRC, colorectal cancer; NOS, not otherwise specified; CEA, carcinoembryonic antigen