Objective To analyze the clinicopathologic data and operative parameters of 209 elderly co-lon cancer patients treated by radical resection between January 2002 and December 2011 ,and to investigate the factors related to recurrence and metastasis after colon cancer radical resection in elderly patients .Methods We used univariate and multivariate analysis of Cox regression ,including 14 variables:age,gender,disease duration, hospitalization duration,surgeon experience,operation duration,laparoscopicsurgery,tumor location,tumor size, gross morphology ,differentiate degree ,depth of bowel wall invasion ,lymph node involvement and obstruction .The survival curve was obtained by Kaplan -Meier method.Results Univariate analysis showed that tumor size (RR=2.658,P<0.0001),gross morphology(Infiltrating type,RR=3.407,P=0.0054),degree of differentiation (RR=0.32,P<0.0001) were associated with tumor relapse and metastasis .Multivariate analysis showed that gender(RR=0.585,P=0.0359),tumor size(RR=2.364,P<0.0001),degree of differentiation (Infiltrating type,RR=0.246,P=0.0437),gross morphology(RR=0.31,P<0.0001)were the significant factors.Conclu-sion Gender,tumor size,degree of differentiation,gross morphology were the independent factors of recurrence and metastasis of colon cancer after radical resection in elderly patients .Targeted follow -up for high -risk groups will improve patients′life quality and prolong their survival time .