Effect of sarcopenia on prognosis of patients with gastric cancer.

Abstract

192 Background: Recently, some studies reported the correlation between low skeletal muscle mass (sarcopenia) of patients with cancer and poor prognosis. There were no reports mentioned the relationship of sarcopenia to patients with gastric cancer. Objective: To evaluate the impact of sarcopenia on survival of patients with gastric cancer. Methods: From April 2005 to December 2010, 243 patients with gastric cancer underwent gasrectomy. Patients were divided in two groups, sarcopenia and nonsarcopenia group. Sarcopenia was defined as muscle mass below the median on preoperative CT scan. Muscle mass was assessed by psoas muscle density and total psoas area. The third lumbar vertebra (L3) was chosen as the standard landmark. We examined the relationship between sarcopenia and overall survival (OS), cancer specific survival (CSS), and disease free survival (DFS). Results: The mean age was 67.6 years old. 95 patients underwent total gastrectomy, 150 did distal gastrectomy, and 18 did proximal gastrectomy. The number of laparoscopic surgery was 62 cases. The CSS and DFS of patients in sarcopenia group were significantly shorter than nonsarcopenia group (p=0.012, p=0.023). The OS of sarcopenia tented to shorter (p=0.12). Conclusions: The presence of sarcopenia was found to significantly increase a patient’s risk of gastric cancer.