{"entity":{"id":"escc-vs-eac","kind":"term","name":"Squamous cell carcinoma vs adenocarcinoma of the oesophagus","aka":[],"tldr":"Oesophageal cancer is two different diseases in one organ: squamous cell carcinoma (upper/mid oesophagus, tobacco and alcohol, dominant in Asia) and adenocarcinoma (lower oesophagus, reflux and obesity, dominant in the West).","summary":"ESCC is ~85% of cases worldwide, concentrated in the 'oesophageal cancer belt' from Iran to China; genetically resembles head-and-neck squamous cancer (TP53, NOTCH1, CCND1, SOX2) and responds better to chemoradiation and immunotherapy. EAC arises from Barrett's, resembles gastric adenocarcinoma (HER2 amplification in ~15-20%), and is treated on gastric-like pathways (FLOT, trastuzumab, zolbetuximab trials). Trial eligibility, PD-L1 scoring (TAP vs CPS), and surgery differ between them.","asOf":"2026-09-07","wikipedia":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Esophageal_cancer","links":[{"label":"The Cancer Genome Atlas: integrated genomic characterization of oesophageal carcinoma (Nature 2017)","url":"https://doi.org/10.1038/nature20805"}],"tags":[],"related":[],"cancers":["esophageal"],"sections":[],"technologies":[],"targets":[],"drugs":[],"companies":[],"institutions":[],"pathways":[],"terms":["siewert-classification","barretts-esophagus"],"trials":[],"people":[],"bottlenecks":[],"keyPapers":["paper-cancer-genome-atlas-research-nature"],"journals":[],"dependsOn":[],"notes":[],"category":"Pathology"},"route":"/terms/escc-vs-eac/","neighbours":{"cancer":[{"id":"esophageal","kind":"cancer","name":"Oesophageal cancer","route":"/cancers/esophageal/"}],"term":[{"id":"barretts-esophagus","kind":"term","name":"Barrett's oesophagus","route":"/terms/barretts-esophagus/"},{"id":"siewert-classification","kind":"term","name":"Siewert classification (GEJ tumours)","route":"/terms/siewert-classification/"}],"paper":[{"id":"paper-cancer-genome-atlas-research-nature","kind":"paper","name":"Integrated genomic characterization of oesophageal carcinoma","route":"/key-papers/paper-cancer-genome-atlas-research-nature/"}]}}