Endoscopic treatment of early gastric cancer

Laser therapy and endoscopic strip biopsy for early gastric cancer are useful measures from our experience. It is considered that the larger lesion of early cancer should be treated by laser therapy and the smaller lesion by strip biopsy. However, endoscopic therapy as a curative treatment still presents problems. Clinical trials with laser therapy has to accumulate to ascertain the effectiveness of laser on the gastric wall. Also, endoscopic treatment methods are limited to patients who cannot be admitted to surgery. Furthermore, it is difficult to judge the metastasis to lymph nodes surrounding the stomach with present diagnostic capabilities. Wider application of these endoscopic treatment methods will follow when these difficulties are overcome.