Hypopharynx

--Hoffman HT, Karnell LH, Shah JP, Ariyan S, Brown GS, Fee WE, Glass AG, Goepfert H, Ossoff RH, Fremgen AM. Hypopharngeal Cancer Patient Care Evaluation. Laryngoscope 1997; 107:1005-17. (!)

This study investigates patterns of presentation, diagnosis, and treatment as well as outcome for 2,939 patients diagnosed with squamous cell carcinoma (SCC) of the hypopharynx between 1980-1985 and 1990-1992. The largest percentage arose in the pyriform sinus (64.4%). A substantial proportion (23.6%), however, was not assigned a subsite, probably as a result of the large size of many hypopharyngeal tumors. Due to a paucity of symptoms or failure to address early symptoms, this disease most frequently presented at an advanced stage (77.4% being stage III or IV). Overall 5-year, disease- specific survival was 33.4%, representing 63.1% (stage I), 57.5% (stage II), 41.8% (stage III), and 22.0% (stage IV). When compared to laryngeal SCC data (collected in the same study), hypopharyngeal SCC is more highly associated with heavy use of alcohol and with previous or synchronous cancers.

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