The significance of ulcer disease on late mortality after partial gastric resection

To study the causes of long-term mortality after peptic ulcer surgery with special attention to the impact of underlying ulcer disease.

Retrospective cohort investigation.

A cohort of 1305 patients who had surgery for gastric and duodenal ulcer disease 29 to 59 years ago. At the end of follow-up 80% of gastric ulcer patients, and 64% of duodenal ulcer patients were dead.

Overall mortality was significantly higher among gastric ulcer patients: standardized mortality ratio (SMR) 1.17 (95% confidence interval (CI) 1.05-1.29); duodenal ulcer patients had an overall mortality comparable to the reference population: SMR 1.06 (CI 0.97-1.15). Excess mortality among gastric ulcer patients was found to be due to neoplasms in gastrointestinal organs (SMR 1.54 (CI 1.11-2.11) which developed more than 20 years postoperatively, and to respiratory diseases and suicide unrelated to time since surgery. An increased mortality due to malignant tumours, respiratory diseases and suicide was also found among duodenal ulcer patients but this increased mortality was offset due to a significantly decreased mortality in diseases of the heart and vascular system (SMR 0.86 (CI 0.75-0.97)), evident mainly after 20 years postoperatively. Excess mortality due to gastrointestinal cancers outnumbered excess mortality from carcinomas in the respiratory organs, and was due to cancers in the stomach, colon and pancreas.

An increased mortality due to gastrointestinal carcinoma, especially gastric and pancreatic carcinoma, is apparent regardless of underlying ulcer disease. As preventive measures against these tumours have yielded little benefit in prospective trials, and as smoking-related diseases and tumours together with suicide constitute 75% of the excess mortality, measures to combat smoking and suicide might be more worthwhile to reduce mortality in this cohort.