Gastric carcinoma: curative resection and adjuvant chemotherapy

A retrospective study of gastric adenocarcinoma treated with surgery as curative attempt was performed at the Oncology Service, in the Hospital Regional 20 de Noviembre, ISSSTE. Morbidity and mortality of the surgical procedures were evaluated, the significance of several risk factors and the survival impact of adjuvant chemotherapy with 5-fluorouracil (5-FU) and mitomycin C (MMC). In the period from 1975 to 1991 a total of 483 new cases were seen. In only 54 patients (11.2%) was it possible to undertake a curative resection. The patients were assigned to three groups of treatment: surgery alone (14 cases), surgery + 5-FU (19 cases), and surgery + 5-FU+MMC (21 cases). Three different types of surgical techniques are regularly performed in our service for gastric cancer treatment: Billroth II distal gastrectomy, total gastrectomy with Roux-En-Y reconstruction, and esophagogastrectomy with esophagogastrostomy. Surgical morbidity and mortality was low, with 9% of duodenal stump fistulas and 27% with partial stenosis of esophagojejunostomy; the operative mortality was zero. Chemotherapy toxicity was transient and low, no related deaths were recorded. The prognostic factors associated significantly with survival were lymph node status and tumor penetration. The histologic differentiation as well as the tumor location and type of surgery had no significance. The estimated 5-year survival of the patients treated with surgery alone was 62%, while that of the patients treated with surgery plus chemotherapy was 38%. These groups were not comparable, however, because of important differences in their prognostic factors. The groups treated with 5-FU alone or in combination with MMC had no survival difference between them.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)