Impact of Age Stratification on the Clinicopathological Characteristics and Survival Outcomes on Stage IV Oral Tongue Squamous Cell Carcinomas

Background To assess clinicopathological characteristics and prognostic value of age stratification on overall survival (OS) and cancer-specific survival (CSS) for stage IV oral tongue squamous cell carcinoma.Methods A total of 1357 patients were extracted from the SEER database between 2010 and 2014.Results Younger patients tended to be male and present with advanced N classification and advancing age increases the risk of cancer related death. Subgroups analysis shows that the effect of advancing age was significantly associated with a higher risk of poor survival in non-Asian who harbored T2/T3/T4a, N2b/N2c or non-metastatic disease (all p < 0.05).Conclusions In high-risk patients, tumor characteristics rather than age should be considered when making treatment decisions.