Management of elderly patients with early gastric cancer in Japan

Potential for expanding indications and curability criteria of endoscopic resection for early gastric cancer in elderly patients: results from a Japanese multicenter prospective cohort study

BACKGROUND AND AIMS

Evidence for endoscopic resection (ER) in elderly patients with early gastric cancer (EGC) is limited. We assessed its clinical outcomes and explored new indications and curability criteria.

METHODS

We analyzed data from a Japanese multicenter, prospective cohort study. Patients aged ≥75 years with EGC treated with ER were included. We classified eCuraC-2 (corresponding to noncurative ER, defined in the Japanese gastric cancer treatment guidelines) into elderly-high (>10% estimated metastatic risk) and elderly-low (EL-L) (≤10% estimated metastatic risk).

RESULTS

In total, 3371 patients with 3821 EGCs were included; endoscopic submucosal dissection was the prominent treatment choice. Among them, 3586 lesions met the guidelines' ER indications, and 235 did not. The proportions of en bloc and R0 resections and perforations were 98.9%, 94.4%, and 0.8%, respectively, in EGCs within the indications. In EGCs beyond the indications, they were 99.5%, 85.4%, and 5.9%, respectively, for lesions diagnosed as ≤3 cm and 96.0%, 64.0%, and 18.0%, respectively, for those >3 cm. Curative ER and EL-L were observed in 83.6% and 6.2% of lesions within the indications, respectively, and in 44.2% and 16.8% of lesions <3 cm beyond the indications, respectively. The 5-year cumulative gastric cancer death rates after curative ER and elderly-high were 0.3% (95% confidence interval [CI], 0.2-0.6) and 3.5% (95% CI, 2.0-5.7), respectively. After EL-L, the rate was 0.9% (95% CI, 0.2-3.5) even without subsequent treatment.

CONCLUSIONS

The usefulness of endoscopic submucosal dissection for elderly EGC patients was confirmed by their clinical outcomes. Lesions of ≤3 cm and EL-L emerged as new ER indication and curability criteria, respectively. (Clinical trial registration number: UMIN000005871.).

Long-term outcomes after endoscopic submucosal dissection for relative indication early gastric cancer in nonsurgical candidates

BACKGROUND AND AIMS

Endoscopic submucosal dissection (ESD) is effective in treating early gastric cancer (EGC). Its role in patients with comorbidities along with more advanced disease is unknown. We sought to evaluate this in a large Western cohort.

METHODS

Consecutive patients who underwent ESD for EGC in a single tertiary Western endoscopy center over 10 years were prospectively analyzed. The primary outcomes were long-term overall survival (OS) and disease-free survival (DFS) up to 5 years. Secondary outcomes were efficacy and serious adverse events (SAEs).

RESULTS

ESD for 157 cases of EGC in 149 patients was performed in an elderly and comorbid cohort with a mean age of 73.7 years and age-adjusted Charlson Comorbidity Index of 4.2. Over a median follow-up of 51.6 months, no significant differences were found in 5-year OS (88.9% vs 77.9%, P = .290) and DFS (83.2% vs 75.1%, P = .593) between absolute indication (AI) EGC and relative indication (RI) EGC. The AI EGC cohort achieved higher en-bloc (96.3% vs 87.5%, P = .069) and R0 resection rates (93.6% vs 62.5%, P < .001) when compared with RI EGC. No significant differences were found in SAEs (7.3% vs 12.5%, P = .363). No mortality or surgical resection ensued from adverse events from ESD.

CONCLUSIONS

ESD safely confers DFS in poor surgical candidates with RI EGC in a large Western cohort. Patients who are elderly and/or with comorbidities or decline surgical resection may benefit from ESD and avoid the risks of surgery and its long-term sequelae. (Clinical trial registration number: NCT02306707.).

Global research trends of endoscope in early gastric cancer: A bibliometric and visualized analysis study over past 20 years

Objectives

Early gastric cancer (EGC) is defined as aggressive gastric cancer involving the gastric mucosa and submucosa. Early detection and treatment of gastric cancer are beneficial to patients. In recent years, many studies have focused on endoscopic diagnosis and therapy for EGC. Exploring new methods to analyze data to enhance knowledge is a worthwhile endeavor, especially when numerous studies exist. This study aims to investigate research trends in endoscopy for EGC over the past 20 years using bibliometric analysis.

Methods

Original articles and reviews examining the use of endoscopy for EGC published from 2000 to 2022 were retrieved from the Web of Science Core Collection, and bibliometric data were extracted. Microsoft Office Excel 2016 was used to show the annual number of published papers for the top 10 countries and specific topics. VOSviewer software was used to generate network maps of the cooccurrences of keywords, authors, and topics to perform visualization network analysis.

Results

In total, 1,009 published papers met the inclusion criteria. Japan was the most productive country and had the highest number of publications (452, 44.8%), followed by South Korea (183, 18.1%), and China (150, 14.9%). The National Cancer Center of Japan was the institution with the highest number of publications (48, 4.8%). Ono was the most active author and had the highest number of cited publications. Through the network maps, exploring endoscopic diagnosis and therapy were major topics. Artificial intelligence (AI), convolutional neural networks (CNNs), and deep learning are hotspots in endoscopic diagnosis. Helicobacter pylori eradication, second-look endoscopy, and follow-up management were examined.

Conclusions

This bibliometric analysis investigated research trends regarding the use of endoscopy for treating EGC over the past 20 years. AI and deep learning, second-look endoscopy, and management are hotspots in endoscopic diagnosis and endoscopic therapy in the future.

Endoscopic Resection of Undifferentiated Early Gastric Cancer

Endoscopic resection (ER) is widely performed for early gastric cancer (EGC) with a negligible risk of lymph node metastasis (LNM) in Eastern Asian countries. In particular, endoscopic submucosal dissection (ESD) leads to a high en bloc resection rate, enabling accurate pathological evaluation. As undifferentiated EGC (UD-EGC) is known to result in a higher incidence of LNM and infiltrative growth than differentiated EGC (D-EGC), the indications for ER are limited compared with those for D-EGC. Previously, clinical staging as intramucosal UD-EGC ≤2 cm, without ulceration, was presented as 'weakly recommended' or 'expanded indications' for ER in the guidelines of the United States, Europe, Korea, and Japan. Based on promising long-term outcomes from a prospective multicenter study by the Japan Clinical Oncology Group (JCOG) 1009/1010, the status of this indication has expanded and is now considered 'absolute indications' in the latest Japanese guidelines published in 2021. In this study, which comprised 275 patients with UD-EGC (cT1a, ≤2 cm, without ulceration) treated with ESD, the 5-year overall survival (OS) was 99.3% (95% confidence interval, 97.1%-99.8%), which was higher than the threshold 5-year OS (89.9%). Currently, the levels of evidence grades and recommendations for ER of UD-EGC differ among Japan, Korea, and Western countries. Therefore, a further discussion is warranted to generalize the indications for ER of UD-EGC in countries besides Japan.