The subjects of this study included 427 hospitalized
patients with advanced cancer; 222 of
them were males. The median age was 66 years
(range: 27e93). With regard to the primary
cancer origins, lung cancer was the largest
group (19.9%), followed by liver (18.0%) and
colorectal (11.0%) cancers. The median survival
was 13 days (ranging from 1 to 418
days). More than three-fourths of these patients
had an ECOG performance status of 3
or 4 (Table 1).