Stomach cancer — is it a lost cause?

A retrospective study of 7 years of endoscopy at Trafford General Hospital from 1986–1993 identified 143 patients diagnosed as having gastric cancer, of whom 13 cases were identified as early gastric cancer. Epigastric pain was the main symptom (66%) of those presenting with resectable disease. Weight loss (70%) was the most common symptom of patients presenting with advanced disease. Forty-seven patients had no surgery and 25 had palliative non-resective surgery. These two groups account for 50% of cases. With such a small detection rate of early gastric cancer and consequent curative surgery rate one must debate whether treatment of stomach cancer in the Trust hospital of the future is a lost cause.