Impact of Lymph Node Count versus Lymph Node Ratio (LNR) on Survival Analysis in UICC Stage III Colorectal Cancer

Background: Lymph node status is an important prognostic factor in curative oncologic colorectal surgery. An inadequate number of lymph nodes may result in under-staging with consequences on therapeutic and prognostic effects. The aim of our study was to evaluate the impact of total lymph node count (LNC) in comparison to the lymph node ratio (LNR) on overall (OAS) and disease specific survival (DSS) in UICC stage III colorectal cancer. Methods: Data were collected prospectively within an audit-proof proprietary colorectal cancer database. The cutoff point of LNC was chosen as 12 because of current guidelines re…