Impact of Age on the Prognosis of Operable Gastric Cancer Patients: An Analysis Based on SEER Database

To investigate the impact of age on the clinicopathological features and survival of patients with gastric cancer (GC), and hope to better define age-specific patterns of GC and possible associated risk factors. Using the surveillance, epidemiology, and end results (SEER) database to search the patients who diagnosed GC between 2007 and 2011 with a known age. The overall and 5-year gastric cancer specific survival (CSS) data were obtained using Kaplan–Meier plots. Multivariable Cox regression models were built for the analysis of long-term survival outcomes and risk factors. A total of 7762 GC patients treated with surgery during the 4-year study period were included in the final study cohort. We divided into five subgroups according to the different age ranges. The overall 5-year cause-specific survival (CSS) was 60.3% in Group 1 (below 45 years), 60.3% in the Group 2 (45–55 years), 61.2% in Group 3 (56–65 years), 59.2% in Group 4 (66–75 years), and 59.2% in Group 5 (older than 76 years). Kaplan–Meier plots showed that patients older than 76 years had the worst 5-year CSS of 56.0% rate in all the subgroups. Age, tumor size, primary site, histological type, and Tumor Node Metastasis stage were identified as significant risk factors for poor survival on univariate analysis (all P