What is the Prognosis of Uterine Cancer?

The prognosis of uterine cancer informs patients about their chances of recovery  and/or recurrence of the disease. Understanding the prognosis and what the future holds helps the patient and the family to handle the disease and living with it better. This also helps the patients and their loved ones to decide on most appropriate treatment, the lifestyle changes, and finances.

Prognosis of uterine cancer depends on many factors, and some of the important ones are:

• Type of cancer.
• Stage of cancer that includes the size of the tumour, extent of involvement of the organ, and its spread to other parts of the body.
• Grade of tumour (how abnormal or malignant the cancer cells are and how quickly the cells grow and spread).
• Patient factors such as age, general health, and response to treatment.

When explaining the prognosis, your doctor will base the prognosis on information obtained through studies done over many years on hundreds or even thousands of people with uterine cancer. The doctor may consider the prognosis to be favourable if the cancer is in early stages and likely to respond well to treatment. The prognosis is believed to be unfavourable if the cancer is likely to be difficult to control. However, remember that prognosis is only a possible prediction and not an absolute outcome for a particular patient.

A major factor which decides the prognosis and 5 year survival is the stage of cancer. Survival rates of a cancer indicate the proportion of people, with a certain type and stage of cancer, who live for a specific period of time after their diagnosis. The five-year survival rate indicates the percentage of people with the disease who are still alive five years after diagnosis (factors such as signs or symptoms of cancer, presence or absence of disease, or treatment are not considered).

Based on studies the stage of uterine cancer on diagnosis is as follows:

• Localised stage (cancer confined to the primary site). 72% of uterine cancer cases are localised in nature.
• Regional stage which means cancer which has spread to regional lymph nodes or directly beyond the primary site.  16% of uterine cancer cases are reported in this stage.
• Distant stage (cancer which has metastasized) includes 8% of uterine cancer cases.
• Unknown stage (stage not known). This is a rare stage and 4% uterine cancer cases are reported in this stage.

5 year survival rate of uterine cancer based on research is as follows:

• Overall 5-year cancer survival rate of uterine cancer is 84.4 %.
• Localized stage: 96.1 %.
• Regional stage: 66.3 %.
• Distant stage: 25.2 %.
• Unstaged cancer: 57.3 %.

Your doctor post examination and tests will discuss the prognosis with you. However, prognosis is only the possible course and the doctor cannot be absolutely sure about the outcome.

Read more articles on Uterine Cancer Diagnosis and Prognosis