Introduction: The prognostic relevance of gender is undetermined in patients with small-cell lung cancer (SCLC). Therefore, we investigated whether gender is a prognostic factor in a SCLC cohort after controlling for confounding factors.
Materials and methods: Fifteen prognostic factors were classified into four groups (patient, stage migration, tumor, and treatment). The prognostic relevance of gender was evaluated using propensity score matching, Cox proportional hazards regression, and stepwise fashion adjustments.
Results: Of 591 patients with SCLC, 88 were women (14.9%). Women were more likely than men to have no history of smoking (48.9% vs. 2.0%, P < 0.001) and limited disease (48.9% vs. 37.8%, P = 0.050). Women had less progressive disease in M stage than men (52.3% vs. 62.8%, P = 0.031). Women had better survival than men in the entire cohort (median survival times [MSTs] and 95% confidence intervals [CIs]: 9.7 months and 7.8-11.6 for women, 8.0 months and 7.0-8.9 for men, log-rank P = 0.034) and in the matched cohort (MSTs and 95% CIs: 8.8 months and 5.8-11.8 for women, 5.9 months and 4.5-7.4 for men, log-rank P = 0.013). Female gender was a prognostic factor predicting better survival, even after stepwise and full adjustment with all prognostic variables (adjusted hazard ratios and 95% CIs: 0.51 and 0.34-0.77, P = 0.001 for entire cohort, 0.42 and 0.24-0.75, P = 0.003 for matched cohort).
Conclusions: Our results confirmed that gender is an independent prognostic factor in patients with SCLC.