Outcome of colorectal cancer

Abstract

The outcome of 454 patients who presented with colorectal carcinoma during a 16 year period is reviewed: 54 per cent were males, 58 per cent were aged more than 60 and 10 per cent had an emergency admission, 42 per cent of tumours occurred in the rectum. A curative resection was possible in 68 per cent. Postoperative mortality was 7 per cent. The overall crude 5-year survival was 41 per cent. The mortality from local recurrence was significantly higher in rectal (11·7 per cent) than in colonic cancer (8·8 per cent; P<0·01). The rate of recurrence and metastases was higher in patients with low rectal cancer than in patients with cancer of the middle and the upper rectum (P<0·01). Distant metastases were the cause of death in 94 per cent of the patients who had a Miles' operation for cancer of the middle rectum, whereas local recurrence was responsible for late mortality in 80 per cent of patients who underwent an anterior resection. No difference in 5-year survival was found in the restorative and in the excisional group.