Prognostic factors in cervical cancer on the basis of morphometric evaluation.

As for all tumours, the most important prognostic factors in cervical cancer are growth pattern and the extent of its spread. The systematic study of serial giant sections of specimens obtained at radical hysterectomy has made these morphological factors assessable by biometry. Statistical analysis produced the following ranking of prognostic factors in cervical cancer: the size of the primary tumour, lymph node involvement, infiltration of the connective tissue layer between cervix and parametrium, exophytic growth, parametrial invasion, and mitotic rate. These factors can be used in a biomathematical model to exclude or predict tumour recurrence or death from disease.