THROMBOCYTOSIS AS A PROGNOSTIC FACTOR IN WOMEN WITH CERVICAL-CANCER

Background. Thrombocytosis (a platelet count >400 X 10(9)/l) is found frequently in association with malignant disease and recently has been suggested to be a poor prognostic indicator in patients with cervical cancer. The authors decided to see if these findings could be verifie d. Methods. The pretreatment platelet counts of 643 women treated for cervical cancer between 1983 and 1992 were reviewed and correlated to each patient's age, stage of disease, histologic type, node status (wh en available), and outcome. Differences between groups were analyzed u sing the chi(2) test, and survival was compared using the log rank tes t on Kaplan-Meier life tables. Results. The 9-year survival rate for p atients with thrombocytosis was 57.1%, which was significantly worse t han the 76.5% for those with normal platelet counts (P < 0.01). When a djusted for stage of disease, however, thrombocytosis failed to have a significant effect on patient survival. There was also no relation be tween thrombocytosis and the incidence of positive lymph nodes. Conclu sion. Thrombocytosis was not found to be an independent prognostic fac tor in patients with carcinoma of the cervix in this series of 643 pat ients.