BACKGROUND Preoperative pulmonary function plays an important role in selecting surgical candidates and assessing postoperative complications. Reduced pulmonary function is associated with poor survival in several cancers, but the prognostic value of preoperative pulmonary function in esophageal squamous cell carcinoma (ESCC) is unclear. Nutritional and systemic inflammation parameters are vital to cancer survival, and the combination of these parameters improves the prognostic value. The hemoglobin, albumin, lymphocytes and platelets (HALP) score is a novel prognostic indicator to reflect the nutritional and inflammation status, but the clinical effects of the HALP score combined with maximal voluntary ventilation (MVV), an important parameter of pulmonary function, have not been well studied in ESCC. AIM To investigate the prognostic value of MVV and HALP score for assessing postoperative survival of ESCC patients. METHODS Data from 834 ESCC patients who underwent radical esophagectomy with R0 resection were collected and retrospectively analyzed. Preoperative MVV and HALP data were retrieved from medical archives. The HALP score was calculated by the formula: Hemoglobin (g/L) × albumin (g/L) × lymphocytes (/L)/platelets (/L). The optimal cut-off values of MVV and HALP score were calculated by the receiver operating characteristic curve analysis. The Kaplan-Meier method with log-rank test was used to draw the survival curves for the variables tested. Multivariate Cox proportional hazard regression models were used to analyze the independent prognostic factors for overall survival. RESULTS MVV was significantly associated with gender ( P < 0.001), age at diagnosis ( P < 0.001), smoking history ( P < 0.001), drinking history ( P < 0.001), tumor length ( P = 0.013), tumor location ( P = 0.037) and treatment type ( P = 0.001). The HALP score was notably associated with gender ( P < 0.001), age at diagnosis ( P = 0.035), tumor length ( P < 0.001) and invasion depth ( P = 0.001). Univariate Cox regression analysis showed that low MVV and low HALP score were associated with worse overall survival (all P < 0.001). Multivariate analysis showed that low MVV and the HALP score were both independent risk factors for overall survival (all P < 0.001). The combination of MVV and HALP score improved the prediction performance for overall survival than tumor-node-metastasis. Also, low combination of MVV and HALP score was an independent risk factor for poor overall survival ( P < 0.001). CONCLUSION MVV, HALP score and their co...

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Objective: This study aimed to determine if gastric cardia adenocarcinoma (GCA) risk was associated with the lys (A or *2) allele at the rs671 (glu504lys) polymorphism within the aldehyde dehydrogenase 2 (ALDH2) gene in a Chinese Han population. We also aimed to investigateALDH2 genotypic distributions between subjects from high- and low-incidence areas for both GCA and esophageal squamous cell carcinoma (ESCC). Methods: We designed a case-control study including 2,686 patients with GCA and 3,675 control subjects from high- and low-incidence areas for both GCA and ESCC in China. TaqMan allele discrimination assay was used to genotype the rs671 polymorphism.χ2 test and binary logistic regression analysis were used to estimate the odds ratios for the development of GCA, and multivariate ordinal logistic regression was used to analyzeALDH2 genotypic distributions among different groups. Results: Compared withALDH2*1/*1 homozygotes,ALDH2*1/*2 andALDH2*2/*2 carriers did not increase the risk for GCA in the Chinese Han population (P>0.05). Interestingly, the ratio of homozygous or heterozygousALDH2 *2 carriers in high-incidence areas for both GCA and ESCC was lower than that in low-incidence areas (P<0.001). Conclusions: Genotypes of rs671 atALDH2 may not increase GCA susceptibility in Chinese Han populations. In addition, theALDH2 genotypic distribution differs between Chinese Han populations from high- and low-incidence areas for both GCA and ESCC. Our findings may shed light on the possible genetic mechanism for the dramatic geographic differences of GCA occurrence in China.