What is prognosis for oesophagus cancer?
Patient: my uncle has been diagnosed with oesophegus cancer just this morning. there was alump on his neck which we got checked out and they said somethng about cancerious cells. he does not feel any discomfort when eating and no vimitting nothing! he feels normal so i mguess it is inthe initial stages. he is about 55 years of age and no health problem. quite fit in fact! i wanted to know about the survial rate and everything in general! =( Doctor: Thanks for your question on HCM.Treatment, prognosis and life expectancy of any cancer is depend on its staging. And this goes true with esophageal malignancy.So to determine staging in his case following investigation s are needed.1. CT scan of neck to see for local extent of disease.2. PET scan to see for distal spread of disease.If distal spread is present then it is known as stage 4 cancer and it carries poor prognosis. Life expectancy is less than 1 year. Only palliative chemotherapy and radiotherapy is given.In the absence of distal spread surgical removal of esophagus with clear margin is the treatment of choice. Post operative chemotherapy and radiotherapy is given to prevent local as well as distal spread. In these cases life expectancy is less than 5 years.Overall esophageal malignancy is not having good prognosis because of poor feeding issues after surgery.