Clinicopathological features and prognosis of younger patients with gastric carcinoma

Abstract

Background: The incidence rate of gastric carcinoma (GC) in young patients has increased in recent decades in China. The objective of this study was to examine the clinicopathological features and prognosis of younger patients with GC and to investigate the impact of younger age (≤50 years) on the presentation and survival outcomes of patients with GC. Methods: A total of 411 GC patients, whose operations were performed by the same surgeon, were selected at Fudan University Shanghai Cancer Center. Differences in demographic distribution and clinicopathological features were analysed between 102 younger (≤50 years of age, young group, YG) and 290 old (51–70 years of age, old group, OG) GC patients. In addition, the surgical features and prognosis of the two groups were retrospectively investigated. Results: The percentage of females in the YG was significantly higher than that in the OG (45.1% and 24.5%, respectively; P Conclusions: In comparison with old patients, young patients with GC show unique features, including a higher percentage of females, a higher percentage of the T1 depth of invasion, undifferentiated histological grade, normal preoperative CA19-9 level and normal preoperative CEA level. In particular, males ≤50 years showed a higher rate of early stage disease with better survival than males aged >50 years, while the prognosis of females aged ≤50 years was as poor as that of females aged >50 years.