Given that ESOPEC did not mandate PET staging, are the conclusions of the study still applicable for patients who are staged with PET?  

I believe the study results are still applicable to patients who are staged with PET.ESOPEC supplementary data show that 7 patients (all in the pre-op CRT group) had M1 disease at diagnosis, which was discovered due to PET staging. The total number of patients in each study arm with M1 disease prior...