[Influence of intraperitoneal chemotherapy to a recurrence pattern of gastric cancer with serosal exposure]

We analyzed a recurrence pattern and prognosis of 42 gastric cancer cases with histological serosal exposure of cancer and without macroscopical residual cancer in the operation. These cases received adjuvant MTX-5-FU chemotherapy intraperitoneally. Twenty four patients showed a recurrence of gastric cancer. Twenty two patients died of recurrence, and two patients were still alive with recurrence. Seventeen patients (71%) developed peritoneal seeding, which means intraperitoneal chemotherapy made no influence to the pattern of recurrence of gastric cancer with serosal invasion. All of the recurred patients with Stage II and IIIA gastric cancer and about 60% of the recurred patients with Stage IIB and IV developed peritoneal metastasis. The prognosis of recurred 24 patients showed that 9 patients (38%) were kept alive for more than 3 years, and 5 patients (21%) were kept alive for more than 5 years. Intraperitoneal chemotherapy of MTX-5-FU did not touch the pattern of recurrence of gastric cancer with serosal invasion, but the analysis of the prognosis revealed a possibility of improvement of the prognosis.