CT-quantified muscle and fat change in patients after surgery or endoscopic resection for early gastric cancer and its impact on long-term outcomes

The purpose of this study was to evaluate the impact of the body composition changes on patients' long-term outcomes after endoscopic resection or surgery for mucosal gastric cancer. This case-control study included 96 patients who underwent endoscopic resection or surgery after propensity score matching. Areas of fat and muscle measured on CT were compared between the 2 groups. The effects of the variables on disease-free and overall survival were assessed using Cox-regression analysis and Kaplan-Meier survival analysis. The median overall survival of the surgical and endoscopic resection groups was 91.1 and 93.9 months (P=.080). Fat area was decreased significantly more after surgery (P<.001). The number of patients with sarcopenia was increased in the surgery group. Kaplan-Meier plot showed that overall survival was significantly correlated with post-treatment sarcopenia (P=.049). CT-based body composition analysis was helpful to evaluate the change in fat and muscle areas after treatment of early gastric cancer. The losses of fat and muscle after treatment were negatively associated with the patient overall survival.