ArticleBMJ open gastroenterology2021
Survival in colon and rectal cancers in Finland and Sweden through 50 years.
Article in BMJ open gastroenterology, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 22 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
22 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it, 37 citations in OpenAlex.
- Survival Following Colorectal Cancer Surgery in Low- and Middle-Income Countries: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis.Journal of surgical oncology · 2026Pooled it
- Developing a multivariable prediction model of global health-related quality of life in patients treated for rectal cancer: a prospective study in five countries.International journal of colorectal disease · 2024Trial
- Article
- Demographic and Clinical Characteristics of Early-Onset Colorectal Cancer in Sweden and Finland: A Multicentre Retrospective Cohort Study Over Three Decades.Journal of surgical oncology · 2026Article
- Analysis of short-term functional outcomes of colorectal resections in older adults aged 75 years and older: a prospective single health board cohort study.Annals of the Royal College of Surgeons of England · 2026Article
- Recent advances and challenges in colorectal cancer: From molecular research to treatment.World journal of gastroenterology · 2025Review
- Visual presentation of age differences in relative survival of hematological neoplasms in Sweden and the neighboring countries.Annals of hematology · 2025Article
- Tumour deposit count is an independent prognostic factor in colorectal cancer-a population-based cohort study.The British journal of surgery · 2024Article
- The effects of anaesthesia and analgesia on short- and long-term outcomes following colorectal cancer surgery: Protocol for an international, pragmatic, cohort study (ENCORE∗).European journal of anaesthesiology and intensive care · 2024Article
- Income disparities in loss in life expectancy after colon and rectal cancers: a Swedish register-based study.Journal of epidemiology and community health · 2024Article
- Article
- Article
- Quality of life patient/cancer survivor version in Chinese cancer survivors: A validation study.Asia-Pacific journal of oncology nursing · 2023Article
- Survival in gastric and esophageal cancers in the Nordic countries through a half century.Cancer medicine · 2023Article
- Survival in hematological malignancies in the Nordic countries through a half century with correlation to treatment.Leukemia · 2023Article
- Survival in Colon, Rectal and Small Intestinal Cancers in the Nordic Countries through a Half Century.Cancers · 2023Article
- Risk factors for right colon, left colon and rectal cancers differ between men and women: the population-based HUNT study in Norway.Colorectal disease : the official journal of the Association of Coloproctology of Great Britain and Ireland · 2023Article
- Long-term survival trends for primary liver and pancreatic cancers in the Nordic countries.JHEP reports : innovation in hepatology · 2022Article
- Cervical, vaginal and vulvar cancer incidence and survival trends in Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden with implications to treatment.BMC cancer · 2022Article
- Perineural invasion is a prognostic factor in stage II colorectal cancer but not a treatment indicator for traditional chemotherapy: a retrospective cohort study.Journal of gastrointestinal oncology · 2022Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
3 authors at 2 institutions in 3 countries.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
objectivesGlobal survival studies have shown favourable development in colon and rectal cancers but few studies have considered extended periods or covered populations for which medical care is essentially free of charge.
designWe analysed colon and rectal cancer survival in Finland and Sweden over a 50-year period (1967-2016) using data from the Nordcan database. In addition to the standard 1-year and 5-year survival rates, we calculated the difference between these as a novel measure of how well survival was maintained between years 1 and 5.
resultsRelative 1-year and 5-year survival rates have developed favourably without major shifts for men and women in both countries. For Finnish men, 1-year survival in colon cancer increased from 50% to 82%, and for rectal cancer from 62% to 85%. The Swedish survival was a few per cent unit better for 1-year survival but for 5-year survival the results were equal. Survival of female patients for both cancers was somewhat better than survival in men through 50 years. Overall the survival gains were higher in the early compared with the late follow-up periods, and were the smallest in the last 10 years. The difference between 1-year and 5-year survival in colon cancer was essentially unchanged over the 50-year period while in rectal cancer there was a large improvement.
conclusionsThe gradual positive development in survival suggests a contribution by many small improvements rather than single breakthroughs. The improvement in 5-year survival in colon cancer was almost entirely driven by improvement in 1-year survival while in rectal cancer the positive development extended to survival past year 1, probably due to successful curative treatments. The current challenges are to reinvigorate the apparently stalled positive development and to extend them to old patients. For colon cancer, survival gains need to be extended past year 1 of diagnosis.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.