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Surveillance for locally advanced esophageal and gastroesophageal junction (GEJ) cancers: Patterns of recurrence and methods of detection.

32 Background: Trimodality treatment with neoadjuvant chemoradiation (CRT) followed by surgery is a standard treatment for esophageal/GEJ (E/GJ) cancers. Following esophagectomy, there is no strong consensus about optimal surveillance and routine imaging. At our institution, patients have surveillance CT scans every 4-6 months for the first 2 years post-surgery and every 6-12 months for the next 3 years. Methods: An IRB-approved chart review was performed identifying patients who underwent surgical resection for locally advanced E/GJ cancer between January 2011 and December 2015 at the University of Rochester. Study objectives were to describe timing of and methods used to detect recurrence as well as their impact on patient outcomes. Recurrence-free (RFS) and overall survival (OS) were graphed via the Kaplan-Meier method. Results: 138 patients underwent surgical resection for E/GJ cancer during the study period: 107 (77.5%) were male, median age was 64, and 116 patients (84.1%) had adenocarcinoma. 111 patients (80.4%) received neoadjuvant CRT. Median OS for entire cohort was 43.4 months. 65 patients (47.1%) relapsed with a median RFS of 19.8 months. Recurrence was detected by routine imaging in 34 patients (52.3%), imaging triggered by symptoms in 25 patients (38.5%), and symptoms alone in 6 patients (9.2%). Median OS post-relapse was 1.5 months when detected based on symptoms alone, 5.0 months when detected by imaging triggered by symptoms, and 13.5 months when detected by routine scans (Log-rank p = 0.046). There were no significant associations between baseline patient /tumor characteristics and subsequent method of recurrence detection. Conclusions: 47.1% of patients suffered relapse after trimodality therapy for E/GJ cancer, consistent with published literature. Almost half of these were detected based on symptoms despite routine imaging. Increased OS for patients with relapse detected by routine scans is likely related to lead time bias, but may be related to increased treatment intensity, or due to less aggressive tumors. Prospective randomized trials are needed to determine the true benefit of regular surveillance scans among esophageal cancer survivors.