| [ Summary ] |
Although limited surgery, such as preserving the vagus and / or pylorus, has heen applied to early gastric cancer, to improve quality of life after gastrectomy, the results may not be satisfactory. Sentinel node (SN) biopsy, which has been useful tool to predict regional lymph node metastases in breast cancer and melanoma, is expected to be applied to gastric cancer surgery. Although a number of reports have supported the feasibility of the SN concept for early gastric cancer, a standard technique for SN biopsy has not been established. Furthermore, the possibility of false-negative results and micrometastases should be taken into account when SN biopsy is applied to gastric cancer surgery. Thus, it may be inappropriate to omit lymphadenectomy even if frozen sections of SNs display negative results for metastasis. At present, wedge or sleeve gastrectomy, along with the dissection of lymph node stations where tracers are distributed, would be an acceptable procedure for patients with negative SN biopsies observed with frozen sections. |