A comparison of clinico-pathologic characteristics of patients with serous and clear cell carcinoma of the uterus

OBJECTIVE: Serous carcinoma and clear cell carcinomas account for 10% and 3% of endometrial cancers but are responsible for 39% and 8% of cancer deaths, respectively. In this study, we aimed to compare serous carcinoma and clear cell carcinoma regarding the surgico-pathologic and clinical characteristics, and survival, and to detect factors that affected recurrence and survival. MATERIALS AND METHODS: We retrospectively analyzed patients with clear cell and serous endometrial cancer who underwent surgery between January 1993 and December 2013 in our clinic. We used Kaplan-Meier estimator to analyze survival. RESULTS: The tumor type in 49 patients was clear cell carcinomas and was serous uterine carcinoma in 51 patients. Advanced stage (stage III and IV) disease was present in 42% of the patients in the clear cell group, whereas this rate was 62% in the serous group (p=0.044). Lymph node metastasis was detected in 37% of the patients with clear cell carcinomas and 51% of the patients with serous carcinoma (p=0.17). The adjuvant therapies used did not differ significantly between the groups (p=0.192). The groups had similar recurrence patterns. Five-year progression-free survival and the 5-year overall survival were 60.6% and 85.8%, 45.5% and 67.8% in the patients with clear cell carcinomas and serous tumor, respectively. CONCLUSION: With the exception that more advanced stages were observed in patients with serous carcinoma endometrial cancers at presentation, the surgico-pathologic features, recurrence rates and patterns, and survival rates did not differ significantly between the groups with clear cell carcinoma and serous carcinoma endometrial cancers.