A preliminary study on the postoperative survival of patients given aspirin after resection for squamous cell carcinoma of the esophagus or adenocarcinoma of the cardia.

BACKGROUND

We examined the effect of aspirin on survival following resection for squamous cell carcinoma (SCC) of the esophagus or adenocarcinoma of the gastric cardia.

METHODS

Patients who underwent esophagectomy for these cancers between May 2000 and December 2002 were allocated to one of three groups and given daily either a low dose of aspirin, placebo, or no tablets.

RESULTS

The 5-year survival for all patients on aspirin (445) was 51.2%, placebo (658) 41%, and no tablet (495) 42.3% (P = 0.04 for difference between treatments). The 5-year survival for all SCC patients on aspirin (267) was 49.8%, placebo (433) 42.2%, and no tablet (343) 41.2% (P = 0.26). There was a significant improvement in survival for patients with adenocarcinoma of the cardia on aspirin compared with the two control groups combined (P = 0.029). Survival for T2N0M0 SCC patients was significantly improved with aspirin (71) compared with placebo (167) or no tablet (134) (P = 0.0004). However, there was no significant difference between the survival curves for T2N0M0 adenocarcinoma patients on aspirin (21) and the two control groups combined (65) (P = 0.29).

CONCLUSIONS

The results of this preliminary study support further investigation of aspirin as adjuvant therapy to improve survival in subsets of postesophagectomy patients.