Clinical Implication of Serosal Change in Pathologic Subserosa-Limited Gastric Cancer

The aim of this study was to evaluate the clinical implication of serosal change in pathologic subserosa-limited gastric cancer based on a retrospective analysis. A total of 285 patients who were diagnosed with pathologically subserosa-limited gastric cancer were included. The patients were divided into two groups: the accordance group, with subserosa-limited cancer without macroscopic serosa change (n = 124); the discordance group, with subserosa-limited cancer showing macroscopic serosal change (n = 161). Tumor size, number of metastatic lymph nodes, and pathologic N stage were significantly associated with macroscopic serosal change. Serosal change patients presented a higher recurrence rate compared with patients without serosal change (38.0 vs. 20.2% for the 5-year recurrence rate, P = 0.002), and peritoneal seeding presented frequently in serosal-change patients with significance (41.1%). Likewise, the overall survival of serosal-change patients was significantly worse than that for those without serosal change (66.9 vs. 81.4% for the 5-year survival rate, P = 0.002). Serosal change was an independent prognostic factor for overall survival (relative risk 1.784, P = 0.039). Serosal change in pathologic subserosa-limited gastric cancer is related to poor survival. Therefore, adjuvant chemotherapy should be considered for these patients, and adequate follow-up programs instituted for early detection of peritoneal seeding.