Applying Nomograms Based on the Surveillance, Epidemiology and End Results Database to Predict Long-Term Overall Survival and Cancer-Specific Survival in Patients with Oropharyngeal Squamous Cell Carcinomas

Few models regarding to the individualized prognosis assessment of oropharyngeal squamous cell carcinoma (OPSCC) patients were documented. The purpose of this study was to establish nomogram model to predict the long-term overall survival (OS) and cancer-specific survival (CSS) of OPSCC patients. The detailed clinical data for the 10,980 OPSCC patients were collected from the surveillance, epidemiology and end results (SEER) database. Furthermore, we applied a popular and reasonable random split-sample method to divide the total 10,980 patients into 2 groups, including 9881 (90%) patients in the modeling cohort and 1099 (10%) patients in the external validation cohort. Among the modeling cohort, 3084 (31.2%) patients were deceased at the last follow-up date. Of those patients, 2188 (22.1%) patients died due to OPSCC. In addition, 896 (9.1%) patients died due to other causes. The median follow-up period was 45 months (1-119 months). We developed 2 nomograms to predict 5- and 8- year OS and CSS using Cox Proportional Hazards model. The nomograms' accuracy was evaluated through the concordance index (C-index) and calibration curves by internal and external validation. The C-indexes of internal validation on the 5- and 8-year OS and CSS were 0.742 and 0.765, respectively. Moreover, the C-indexes of external validation were 0.740 and 0.759, accordingly. Based on a retrospective cohort from the SEER database, we succeeded in constructing 2 nomograms to predict long-term OS and CSS for OPSCC patients, which provides reference for surgeons to develop a treatment plan and individual prognostic evaluations.