Table 5.

Relationship of CTCs with LC patients’ demographics and clinical characteristics when CTC cut-off is set to 2.

Characteristics	N (Total = 78)	Proportion (%)	CTCs ≥ 2 (per 7.5 mL)	CTCs < 2 (per 7.5 mL)	P
Gender
Male	43	55.13	29	14	0.8719
Female	35	44.87	23	12
Age
≥60	40	51.28	31	9	0.037
<60	38	48.72	21	17
Smoking History
Yes	35	44.87	26	9	0.1979
No	43	55.13	26	17
Histology
Adenocarcinoma	65	83.33	42	23	0.3903
Squamous	13	16.67	10	3
TNM Stage
I	30	38.46	15	15	0.0533
II	7	8.97	4	3
III	13	16.67	10	3
IV	28	35.90	23	5
Tumor Depth
T1	36	46.15	19	17	0.0163
T2	13	16.67	8	5
T3	16	20.51	12	4
T4	13	16.67	13	0
Lymph Node Involvement
N0	40	51.28	20	20	0.0196
N1	4	5.13	4	0
N2	19	24.36	16	3
N3	15	19.23	12	3
Lymph Node Metastasis
Yes	38	48.72	32	6	0.0013
No	40	51.28	20	20
Distant Metastasis
M0	50	64.10	29	21	0.03
M1	28	35.90	23	5

CTCs, circulating tumor cells; n, number; LC, lung cancer; TNM, tumor-node-metastasis. Bold values mean statistically significant. Bold values are all less than 0.05.