Endoscopic submucosal dissection in early gastric cancer. Experience in 16 patients

Background: Endoscopic submucosal dissection (ESD) is a minimally invasive procedure that allows curative treatment of early gastric cancer (EGC) in selected patients. Aim: To report our initial experience with ESD. Material and Methods:Analysis of prospective data from 16 patients aged 61 to 84 years, who under went ESD between December 2011 and June 2014. Tumor type, operative time, hospitalization length, oncologic outcomes, complications and short-term follow up were registered. Results: En-block resection was achieved in all cases. The median operative time was 135 mm (range: 50-320 min). Specimens' median size was 3.5 cm (range: 3-10). All the resections were R0. In 14 patients ESD was considered curative. In two patients, ESD was considered potentially non-curative due to the presence pathological risk factors for lymph-node metastases in the biopsy specimen. Both patients underwent laparoscopic gastrectomy with lymph-node dissection. There was one case of gastric wall perforation that was repaired by laparoscopic suture. There was no mortality. The median follow-up time was 15 months (range: 2-30 months). Conclusions: ESD is a feasible and safe procedure in our institution with good results in this initial experience.