Table 1.

Baseline characteristics of included cohorts.

Study	Country/area	Number (male/female)	Tumor sites	PNI positive n (positive rate)	nCRT1/nCT2  number	TNM edition	Stage of TNM	Outcome	SQ3
Castonguay et al., 2014 [15]	Canada	103 (86/17)	Esophagus	57 (55.3%)	5	AJCC/UICC 7th	I–IV	OS4	7
Chen et al., 2014 [10]	China	433 (321/112)	Esophagus	209 (48.3%)	0	AJCC/UICC 7th	I–III	DFS5, OS	7
Huang et al., 2013 [16]	China	42 (33/9)	Esophagus	14 (33.3%)	0	AJCC/UICC 7th	I–IV	OS	5
Kim et al., 2011 [17]	America	266 (196/70)	Esophagus and EGJ6	29 (10.9%)	162	NR7	NR	OS	6
Liebl et al., 2014 [18]	Germany	311 (249/62)	Esophagus and EGJ	132 (42.4%)	0	AJCC/UICC 7th	I–IV	OS	8
Ning et al., 2015 [19]	China	243 (194/49)	Esophagus	54 (22.2%)	NR	AJCC/UICC 7th	II-III	DFS, OS	7
Noble et al., 2013 [20]	UK	246 (195/51)	Esophagus and EGJ	34 (14.0%)	151	AJCC/UICC 7th	I–IV	DFS, OS	7
Paraf et al., 1995 [21]	France	67 (61/6)	Lower esophagus	26 (38.2%)	0	NR	NR	OS	5
Sun et al., 2015 [22]	Taiwan	26 (23/3)	Esophagus and EGJ	5 (19.2%)	0	AJCC/UICC 7th	I–III	DFS, OS	6
Tachezy et al., 2014 [13]	Germany	695 (555/140)	Esophagus	38 (5.0%)	52	AJCC/UICC 7th	I–IV	OS	7
Tanaka et al.,1998 [11]	Japan	104 (84/20)	Esophagus	48 (46.2%)	22	AJCC/UICC 1993	NR	OS	7
Torres et al., 1999 [23]	America	96 (83/13)	Lower esophagus	31 (32.3%)	61	AJCC/UICC 1993	I–IV	OS	5
Zhang et al., 2012 [24]	China	142 (109/33)	EGJ II-III	87 (61.3%)	0	AJCC/UICC 7th	I–IV	OS	6

¹nCRT: neoadjuvant chemoradiotherapy; ²nCT: neoadjuvant chemotherapy; ³SQ: study quality based on the Newcastle-Ottawa scale; ⁴OS: overall survival; ⁵DFS: disease-free survival; ⁶EGJ: esophagogastric junction; ⁷NR: not reported.