Adjuvant therapy for gastric cancer: a reality at last.
Gastric cancer remains a significant healthcare problem throughout the world and is usually diagnosed at a fairly advanced stage in the West. Despite complete resection of the primary tumor, most patients eventually experience a relapse and die of recurrent disease. Extended surgery has not been shown to improve survival in Western studies. There have been a large number of adjuvant chemotherapy trials over the past several decades, most with negative results. More recently, there is hope for improving these dismal results with a meta-analysis showing a benefit for adjuvant chemotherapy and a large randomized trial, INT-0116, which has just reported a significant survival advantage with combined chemoradiation. These results make adjuvant therapy for completely resected gastric carcinoma the new standard of care, except in the uncommon setting of early intramucosal cancers.
Hecht
J R
JR
Division of Hematology/Oncology, UCLA School of Medicine, 2345H PVUB, 10945 LeConte Avenue, Los Angeles, CA 90095, USA. jrhecht@mednet.ucla.edu
D000903:Antibiotics, Antineoplastic / Q000627:therapeutic use; D017024:Chemotherapy, Adjuvant; D006801:Humans; D016685:Mitomycin / Q000627:therapeutic use; D009367:Neoplasm Staging; D018714:Radiotherapy, Adjuvant; D013274:Stomach Neoplasms / Q000188:drug therapy / Q000401:mortality / Q000473:pathology / Q000601:surgery*; D016019:Survival Analysis
D000903:Antibiotics, Antineoplastic; D016685:Mitomycin