Figure 3.

Correlation between CK20 positivity in blood and bone marrow samples, respectively, and survival for patients with esophageal carcinoma UICC stage I and II. CK20 positivity in (A) blood (n = 20) and (B,C) bone marrow (n = 13) samples of EC patients with lower tumor stages were assessed by RT-PCR and correlated with (A) overall survival in blood samples, (B) overall survival and (C) tumor-specific survival in bone marrow samples. The p-values for the comparison of the cumulative survival probabilities of the two groups (CK20-positive versus CK20-negative) were calculated using the log-rank test. On the vertical dotted line at 60 months, the percentages for 5-year overall survival are shown in brackets. On the horizontal dotted line at the cumulative survival probability of 0.5 is the median survival and is given in months in square brackets.