CORRELATION BETWEEN CLINICOPATHOLOGICAL FEATURES AND PROGNOSTIC FACTORS FOR PATIENTS WITH GASTRIC CANCER

Purpose: To investigate the correlation between clinic-pathological features and prognostic factors for patients with gastric cancer. Methods: A total of 472 patients with gastric cancer were recruited over a 2-year period for this study. They were divided into two groups: upper gastric cancer (177 patients) and middle-lower gastric cancer (295 patients). The patients consisted of 234 males and 238 females aged between 36 and 83 years (55.21 +/- 4.62 years). The clinical data of the patients were collected and retrospectively analyzed. Results: The proportion of male patients, age >= 55, lesion diameter > 4 cm, Borrmann ill -IV and pT staging of T3 - T4 in the UGC group were significantly higher (p < 0.05) than those of MGC group. There was no significant difference (p > 0.05) in lymph node metastasis between the two groups. Lymph node metastasis occurred in 338 patients. Lesion diameter > 4 cm, pT stage of T3 - T4, and lymphatic tumor thrombus in patients with metastasis were significantly higher (p < 0.05) than those in patients without metastasis. There were 91 patients with 3 years of survival in the UGC group and 86 without 3 years of survival. In both groups, the number of patients with lesion diameter > 4 cm, pT stage of T3 - T4 and pN stage of N2 - N3 who had 3 years of survival were significantly lower (p < 0.05) than those without 3 years of survival. Lymph node tumor thrombus and pT staging were risk factors for gastric cancer. Conclusion: There is a positive correlation between clinic-pathological features and prognostic factors of patients with gastric cancer. While pT and pN staging are the prognostic factors for UGC, lesion size, pT and pN staging are the prognostic factors for MGC.