Survival rates are a way to measure how many people survive a certain type of cancer over time. They cannot tell you exactly what will happen with any one person, but they may help give you a better understanding of how likely it is that treatment will be successful.
What is a 5-year relative survival rate?
A relative survival rate compares people with the same stage of esophageal (esophagus) cancer to people in the overall population.
For example, if the 5-year relative survival rate for a specific stage of esophageal cancer is 60%, it means that people who have that cancer are, on average, about 60% as likely as people who don’t have that cancer to live for at least 5 years after being diagnosed.
Where do these numbers come from?
The American Cancer Society relies on information from the Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results (SEER) database, maintained by the National Cancer Institute (NCI), to provide survival statistics for different types of cancer.
The SEER database tracks 5-year relative survival rates for esophageal cancer in the United States, based on how far the cancer has spread. The SEER database, however, does not group cancers by AJCC TNM stages (stage 1, stage 2, stage 3, etc.). Instead, it groups cancers into localized, regional, and distant stages:
- Localized means that the cancer is growing only in the esophagus.
- Regional means that the cancer has spread to nearby lymph nodes or tissues.
- Distant means that the cancer has spread to distant organs or lymph nodes.
5-year relative survival rates for esophageal cancer
These numbers are based on people diagnosed with esophageal cancer between 2015 and 2021.
Stage |
5-Year Relative Survival Rate |
Localized |
49% |
Regional |
28% |
Distant |
5% |
All SEER stages combined |
22% |