Turan B. Prognostic impact of tumor deposits in colorectal cancer. World J Gastroenterol 2025; 31(47): 114506 [DOI: 10.3748/wjg.v31.i47.114506]
Corresponding Author of This Article
Bilal Turan, MD, Assistant Professor, Researcher, Department of General Surgery, Faculty of Medicine, Suleyman Demirel University, Suleyman Demirel Universitesi Arastirma ve Uygulama Hastanesi, Isparta 32260, Türkiye bturan117@gmail.com
Research Domain of This Article
Surgery
Article-Type of This Article
Letter to the Editor
Open-Access Policy of This Article
This article is an open-access article which was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
World J Gastroenterol. Dec 21, 2025; 31(47): 114506 Published online Dec 21, 2025. doi: 10.3748/wjg.v31.i47.114506
Prognostic impact of tumor deposits in colorectal cancer
Bilal Turan
Bilal Turan, Department of General Surgery, Faculty of Medicine, Suleyman Demirel University, Isparta 32260, Türkiye
Author contributions: Turan B designed the overall concept and outline of the manuscript, contributed to the design of the manuscript, the writing and editing of the manuscript, and review of the literature.
Conflict-of-interest statement: The author reports no relevant conflicts of interest for this article.
Open Access: This article is an open-access article that was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: https://creativecommons.org/Licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Corresponding author: Bilal Turan, MD, Assistant Professor, Researcher, Department of General Surgery, Faculty of Medicine, Suleyman Demirel University, Suleyman Demirel Universitesi Arastirma ve Uygulama Hastanesi, Isparta 32260, Türkiye bturan117@gmail.com
Received: September 22, 2025 Revised: October 18, 2025 Accepted: October 29, 2025 Published online: December 21, 2025 Processing time: 89 Days and 4.2 Hours
Abstract
We read with great interest the article by Sun et al addressing the prognostic role of tumor deposits (TDs) and negative lymph nodes in N1c colorectal cancer. Their proposal of the NLNTD index is a valuable step toward refining risk stratification in this subgroup. In our recently published population-based cohort of 111106 patients with early-stage colon cancer, TD positivity, classified as N1c according to AJCC definitions, was independently associated with significantly worse overall and disease-specific survival, even after propensity score matching. Taken together, these findings show that TDs are adverse prognostic factors across stages. They should inform treatment planning and follow-up, rather than be regarded as incidental.
Core Tip: Tumor deposits (TDs) are an independent adverse prognostic factor in colorectal cancer across all stages. Evidence from both single-center analyses introducing the NLNTD index and large-scale population-based cohorts consistently shows that TDs should be recognized as high-risk features and incorporated into adjuvant treatment algorithms and follow-up strategies, rather than regarded as incidental findings.
