Esophageal carcinoma in young patients.

The clinicopathological features of esophageal carcinoma were examined from the viewpoint of age differences in a study of 364 consecutively treated patients. The three groups studied were: group I, aged less than 49 years; group II, aged between 50 and 69 years; and group III, aged more than 70 years. There were no significant differences among the three groups with regard to sex ratio, site and length of the lesion, gross types, histological grade, depth of tumor invasion, vessel permeation, lymph node metastasis, TNM classification, incidence of incomplete resection, or crude actuarial 5-year survival curves. The malignant potentiality of the esophageal carcinoma in young patients did not differ from that in older patients in terms of deoxyribonucleic acid distribution pattern. The only difference clearly evident between young and older patients was the number of hospital deaths due to complications: That of the young patients was significantly lower than that of the older patients (p less than 0.05). Esophageal carcinoma in persons aged less than 50 years appeared to behave biologically like the same neoplasm in older people, whereas gastric and colorectal carcinomas behave differently in various age groups.