Number of Patients, Male	34
Number of Patients, Female	6
Stage	Patients with chemotherapy‐refractory ESCC
Age	Median (range): 63 (47–76) years
Number of Prior Systemic Therapies	Median (range): 2 (1–3)
Performance Status: ECOG	0 — 0 1 — 11 2 — 29 3 — 0 Unknown — 0
Other
From July 2017 to August 2018, we enrolled 40 patients with chemotherapy‐refractory ESCC in the study and observed them until November 2019, when 92.5% (37/40) of OS events were reached. One patient was still alive, whereas the other two patients terminated apatinib because of adverse effects, and we subsequently lost touch with them. Patient baseline characteristics (sex, age, ECOG performance status, smoking history, alcohol use, line of apatinib therapy, surgical history, control of primary tumor, and sites of metastasis) are listed in Table 1.
The median age of these patients was 63 years (range: 47–76). None of the patients in the study had received molecular targeted therapy. An ECOG performance status of 2 was measured in 72.5% (29/40) of patients. Most patients were heavily treated before receiving apatinib, with 57.5% (23/40) of patients receiving second‐line chemotherapy and 7.5% (3/40) receiving third‐line chemotherapy prior to the study. Prior surgery of the primary tumor had been carried out in 21 patients (52.5%), whereas 12.5% (5/40) of patients had an uncontrolled primary tumor. The main recurrent or metastatic sites were the lymph nodes (22%), lungs (40.0%), and liver (32.5%).
Data collection ended on November 6, 2019. During the study, 47.5% (19/40) of patients received 500 mg of once daily apatinib continuously until disease progression or death from any cause. The dose was decreased to 250 mg in 47.5% (19/40) of patients who had intolerable toxicity. Seven of the 40 patients (17.5%) discontinued apatinib treatment in the first 2 weeks, and 52.5% (21/40) of patients had dose reduction or discontinuation, as shown in Table 2.
Cancer Types or Histologic Subtypes	Esophageal squamous cell carcinoma, 40