Progress in new diagnosis and therapeutic strategy for gastrointestinal malignancy: focus on new molecular-targeted...

The core symposiums of the Japanese Gastroenterological Association (JGA) annual scientific meetings focus on similar topics from year to year. The main topics of these symposiums for the last 3 years were centered on progress in new diagnostics and therapeutic strategies for gastrointestinal malignancy, with a special focus on new molecular-targeted treatments for gastrointestinal stromal tumors (GIST), neuroendocrine tumors (NET) and other gastrointestinal (GI) cancers, including malignant lymphoma, for which new molecular-targeted treatments are now being commonly used. The 8th annual meeting of the JGA was held in 2012 and 8 excellent papers were presented on progress in new diagnostics and therapy for GIST. The 9th annual meeting of the JGA was held in 2013 and 7 excellent papers were presented on new molecular-targeted treatments for colorectal carcinomas and GI lymphoma. At the 10th annual meeting of the JGA, which was held in 2014, novel concepts of and therapeutic strategies for GI cancers, NET and GIST were discussed. In 2010, the WHO proposed a new classification system in which NET was classified into three categories - NET-G1, NET-G2 and NEC - dependent on proliferative activity, and the term 'carcinoid' was deleted. Regarding GIST, several management guidelines have already been published: by NCCN in 2004, by ESMO in 2005, and in Japan in 2006. The Japanese guidelines have recently been revised. In addition to the summaries of the annual meetings from 2012 to 2014, the major points of the recently revised Japanese guidelines for the diagnosis and management of GIST are described in this review.