While in chronic diseases, such as diabetes, mortalityrates slowly increases with age, in oncological seriesmortality usually changes dramatically during thefollow-up, often in an unpredictable pattern. Forinstance, i...While in chronic diseases, such as diabetes, mortalityrates slowly increases with age, in oncological seriesmortality usually changes dramatically during thefollow-up, often in an unpredictable pattern. Forinstance, in gastric cancer mortality peaks in thefirst two years of follow-up and declines thereafter.Also several risk factors, such as TNM stage, largelyaffect mortality in the first years after surgery, whileafterward their effect tends to fade. Temporal trendsin mortality were compared between a gastric cancerseries and a cohort of type 2 diabetic patients. Forthis purpose, 937 patients, undergoing curativegastrectomy with D1/D2/D3 lymphadenectomy forgastric cancer in three GIRCG (Gruppo Italiano RicercaCancro Gastrico = Italian Research Group for GastricCancer) centers, were compared with 7148 type 2diabetic patients from the Verona Diabetes Study. Inthe early/advanced gastric cancer series, mortality fromrecurrence peaked to 200 deaths per 1000 personyears1 year after gastrectomy and then declined,becoming lower than 40 deaths per 1000 person-yearsafter 5 years and lower than 20 deaths after 8 years.Mortality peak occurred earlier in more advanced Tand N tiers. At variance, in the Verona diabetic cohort overall mortality slowly increased during a 10-yearfollow-up, with ageing of the type 2 diabetic patients.Seasonal oscillations were also recorded, mortalitybeing higher during winter than during summer. Alsothe most important prognostic factors presented adifferent temporal pattern in the two diseases: whilethe prognostic significance of T and N stage markedlydecrease over time, differences in survival amongpatients treated with diet, oral hypoglycemic drugsor insulin were consistent throughout the follow-up.Time variations in prognostic significance of main riskfactors, their impact on survival analysis and possiblesolutions were evaluated in another GIRCG series of568 patients with advanced gastric cancer, undergoingcurative gastrectomy with D2/D3 lymphadenectomy.Survival curves in the two different histotypes (intestinaland mixed/diffuse) were superimposed in the first threeyears of follow-up and diverged thereafter. Likewise,survival curves as a function of site (fundus vs body/antrum) started to diverge after the first year. On thecontrary, survival curves differed among age classesfrom the very beginning, due to different post-operativemortality, which increased from 0.5% in patients aged65-74 years to 9.9% in patients aged 75-91 years;this discrepancy later disappeared. Accordingly, theproportional hazards assumption of the Cox modelwas violated, as regards age, site and histology. Tocope with this problem, multivariable survival analysiswas performed by separately considering either thefirst two years of follow-up or subsequent years.Histology and site were significant predictors only aftertwo years, while T and N, although significant bothin the short-term and in the long-term, became lessimportant in the second part of follow-up. Increasingage was associated with higher mortality in the firsttwo years, but not thereafter. Splitting survival timewhen performing survival analysis allows to distinguishbetween short-term and long-term risk factors.Alternative statistical solutions could be to excludepost-operative mortality, to introduce in the modeltime-dependent covariates or to stratify on variablesviolating proportionality assumption.展开更多
文摘While in chronic diseases, such as diabetes, mortalityrates slowly increases with age, in oncological seriesmortality usually changes dramatically during thefollow-up, often in an unpredictable pattern. Forinstance, in gastric cancer mortality peaks in thefirst two years of follow-up and declines thereafter.Also several risk factors, such as TNM stage, largelyaffect mortality in the first years after surgery, whileafterward their effect tends to fade. Temporal trendsin mortality were compared between a gastric cancerseries and a cohort of type 2 diabetic patients. Forthis purpose, 937 patients, undergoing curativegastrectomy with D1/D2/D3 lymphadenectomy forgastric cancer in three GIRCG (Gruppo Italiano RicercaCancro Gastrico = Italian Research Group for GastricCancer) centers, were compared with 7148 type 2diabetic patients from the Verona Diabetes Study. Inthe early/advanced gastric cancer series, mortality fromrecurrence peaked to 200 deaths per 1000 personyears1 year after gastrectomy and then declined,becoming lower than 40 deaths per 1000 person-yearsafter 5 years and lower than 20 deaths after 8 years.Mortality peak occurred earlier in more advanced Tand N tiers. At variance, in the Verona diabetic cohort overall mortality slowly increased during a 10-yearfollow-up, with ageing of the type 2 diabetic patients.Seasonal oscillations were also recorded, mortalitybeing higher during winter than during summer. Alsothe most important prognostic factors presented adifferent temporal pattern in the two diseases: whilethe prognostic significance of T and N stage markedlydecrease over time, differences in survival amongpatients treated with diet, oral hypoglycemic drugsor insulin were consistent throughout the follow-up.Time variations in prognostic significance of main riskfactors, their impact on survival analysis and possiblesolutions were evaluated in another GIRCG series of568 patients with advanced gastric cancer, undergoingcurative gastrectomy with D2/D3 lymphadenectomy.Survival curves in the two different histotypes (intestinaland mixed/diffuse) were superimposed in the first threeyears of follow-up and diverged thereafter. Likewise,survival curves as a function of site (fundus vs body/antrum) started to diverge after the first year. On thecontrary, survival curves differed among age classesfrom the very beginning, due to different post-operativemortality, which increased from 0.5% in patients aged65-74 years to 9.9% in patients aged 75-91 years;this discrepancy later disappeared. Accordingly, theproportional hazards assumption of the Cox modelwas violated, as regards age, site and histology. Tocope with this problem, multivariable survival analysiswas performed by separately considering either thefirst two years of follow-up or subsequent years.Histology and site were significant predictors only aftertwo years, while T and N, although significant bothin the short-term and in the long-term, became lessimportant in the second part of follow-up. Increasingage was associated with higher mortality in the firsttwo years, but not thereafter. Splitting survival timewhen performing survival analysis allows to distinguishbetween short-term and long-term risk factors.Alternative statistical solutions could be to excludepost-operative mortality, to introduce in the modeltime-dependent covariates or to stratify on variablesviolating proportionality assumption.
基金国家自然科学基金青年项目"森林经营主体的碳汇供给差异及其诱导机理研究"(71203198)国家自然科学基金面上项目"中国南方集体林区森林碳汇供给潜力及政策工具"(71073148)+1 种基金浙江省哲学社会科学规划项目"浙江省森林生态系统服务供给消费时空差异的测度工具研究"(15NDJC201YB)东南亚环境经济项目(EEPSEA)"The supply of forest carbon sequestration from small-scale forestry:Time preference and attitude to risk"