Sentinel Node Biopsy in Gastric Cancer: Preliminary Results

Abstract

Background: Extent of lymphadenectomy in gastric cancer is one of the still unresolved and ongoing questions. Whether extensive procedures lead to better survival remains controversial. The detection of sentinel node could become a helpful method to define the desirable extent of lymph node dissection for each particular patient. Material and methods: Prospective, single-centre, clinical trial. Sentinel node is identified using vital blue dye. After performance of D2 lymphadenectomy, the pathologist minutely investigates all lymphatic nodes by histological and imunohistochemistry techniques.

Results: During a period of 36 months, an attempt to localise the sentinel node for biopsy was made in 22 patients. The successful rate of sentinel node detection with a good relation between metastatic involvement of the sentinel node and other nodes was 56% (13 out of 22 patients). All these patients suffered from small tumours and early stage of the disease. In large tumours and advanced stages, blue dye stained the tissue around the tumour diffusely rendering the identification of true sentinel node impossible. Fresh frozen section of the sentinel node resulted in two patients in a false negative outcome because of micrometastatic involvement.

Conclusions: Sentinel node biopsy in gastric cancer using vital staining is a feasible method. Reliable results were seen in early stage of the disease. Fresh frozen section of sentinel node has probably a low sensitivity for detection of micro-metastases.

Key Words:

• Gastric cancer
• lymphadenectomy
• sentinel node biopsy

Additional information

Notes on contributors

J. Simsa

Jaromír Simsa, M.D. Department of Surgery 2^nd Medical Faculty Charles University Prague, Hospital Motol V Uvalu 84 150 06 Prague 5 Czech Republic E-mail: [email protected]