Prognosis Statistics
Mesothelioma Prognosis Statistics
Prognosis Statistics
Prognosis Statistics - Survival rates
Prognosis Statistics - Other factors
Prognosis Statistics - Clinical trials
Doctors collect statistical information about the different types of cancer and prognosis. Prognosis is the likely outcome of your disease and treatment. In other words, your chances of getting better and how long you are likely to live.
Following on this page, is quite detailed information about the survival rates of different stages of mesothelioma. We have included it because many people have asked us for this. But not everyone who is diagnosed with a cancer wishes to read this type of information. If you are not sure whether you want to know at the moment or not, then perhaps you might like to skip this page for now. You can always come back to it.
Please note: There are no national statistics available for different stages of cancer or treatments that people may have received. The statistics we present here are pulled together from a variety of different sources, including the opinions and experience of the experts that check each section of CancerHelp UK. We provide statistics because people ask us for them. But they are only intended as a general guide and cannot be regarded as any more than that.
There is a section explaining more about the different types of cancer statistics in the CancerHelp UK section on cancer statistics. Unless you are very familiar with medical statistics, you may find it helpful to read this before you read the information below.
Remember - statistics are averages based on large numbers of patients. They cannot predict exactly what will happen to you. No patients are exactly alike and response to treatment also varies from one person to another.
You should feel free to ask your doctor about your prognosis, but not even your doctor can tell you for sure what will happen. You may hear your doctor use the term '5 year survival'. This relates to the proportion of people in research studies who were still alive 5 years after diagnosis. This is because doctors follow what happens to people for 5 years after treatment in any research study.
The general outlook for mesothelioma
Generally speaking, with cancer the outcome depends on how advanced your cancer is when it is diagnosed. Usually with cancer, the statistics are given for each stage. Stage is just as important for mesothelioma as it is for other cancers. But finding the statistics is more difficult to do. This is because
- Mesothelioma is not all that common, (although incidence is increasing)
- It is usually diagnosed when it is advanced - people may not have symptoms early on and so don't go to the doctor
- Statistics by stage aren't readily available because most people don't have surgery and accurate staging needs an operation
There are two types of mesothelioma. Pleural mesothelioma has three staging systems and peritoneal mesothelioma has no established staging system.
Overall, both types of mesothelioma have a poor outlook. By the time someone has symptoms and goes to their doctor, the disease is very often advanced. Because few people are diagnosed early, there are no reliable statistics for 5 year survival rates for the early stages of mesothelioma.
For both types of mesothelioma, patients are often told that they may have less than a year to live. But mesothelioma specialists, working in leading cancer centres throughout the world, often report better statistics than this based on clinical trials that they are carrying out. Some of these are reported below.
Generally, of all those people diagnosed with mesothelioma only about 1 in 10 (10%) will be alive 3 years later and 1 in 20 (5%) will be alive 5 years later. For those people who have been diagnosed and treated in the earlier stages of the disease, there is little information to draw on. But we have seen reports that quote survival rates of up to 1 in 2 (50%) after 2 years. So the range of survival times is very wide. Survival depends on other factors, as well as stage.
