An ensemble prognostic model for colorectal cancer.

Abstract

Colorectal cancer can be grouped into Dukes A, B, C, and D stages based on its developments. Generally speaking, more advanced patients have poorer prognosis. To integrate progression stage prediction systems with recurrence prediction systems, we proposed an ensemble prognostic model for colorectal cancer. In this model, each patient was assigned a most possible stage and a most possible recurrence status. If a patient was predicted to be recurrence patient in advanced stage, he would be classified into high risk group. The ensemble model considered both progression stages and recurrence status. High risk patients and low risk patients predicted by the ensemble model had a significant different disease free survival (log-rank test p-value, 0.0016) and disease specific survival (log-rank test p-value, 0.0041). The ensemble model can better distinguish the high risk and low risk patients than the stage prediction model and the recurrence prediction model alone. This method could be applied to the studies of other diseases and it could significantly improve the prediction performance by ensembling heterogeneous information.