OBJECTIVE To summarize the regular pattern and state oflymph node metastasis of patients with esophageal and cardiaccarcinomas,so as to analyze factors influencing lymph nodemetastasis.METHoDS Clinical data collected from 1,526 thoracicesophageal and cardiac carcinoma patients who were admitted inthe Fourth Hospital of Hebei Medical University during a periodfrom January 1996 to December 2004,were randomly selectedand an Access Database of the patients information was set up.Eight clinico-pathologic factors,including the patients age,tumorlocation and size,pathological classification,the depth of tumorinvasion,vascular tumor embolus(VTE),the state of surroundingorgan encroachment and the status of tumor residues,wereidentified.A correlation between these factors and metastases wasstatistically analyzed using SPSSl3.0 software.RESULTS Lymph node metastatic sites from esophagealcarcinomas included the thoracic and abdominal cavit. LymphAnode metastasis from the superior esophageal carcinomasmainly occurred in the neck and thoracic cavity.There was atwo-way lymph node metastasis in the patients with the middleesophageal carcinoma.The inferior esophageal carcinomas mainlymetastasized to the ParaesOphageal,paragastric cardia,and leftgastric artery lymph nodes.The rate and degree of the metastasisfrom the inferior esophageal carcinomas were significantly highercompared to those of the superior and the middle esophagealcarcinomas (P