The usefulness of endoscopic ultrasound in the differential diagnosis between benign and malignant gastric ulcer

Abstract

Objective. Gastric cancer can present as an exophytic lesion, diffuse infiltration of the gastric mucosa or even as a gastric ulcer, which can mimic a benign gastric ulcer. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the value of endoscopic ultrasound (EUS) in the differential diagnosis between benign and malignant gastric ulcer. Material and methods. 176 patients with gastric ulcer were divided into two groups on the basis of the cause of ulcer. Benign gastric ulcer group consisted of 102 patients and malignant gastric ulcer group consisted of 74 patients. All patients were examined by radial scanning echoendoscope (Olympus GF-UM 2000). Results. For diagnosis of malignant gastric ulcer, the sensitivity of EUS is 83.8%, the specificity is 62.7% and the accuracy is 71.6%. Conclusions. The results demonstrate that EUS is a useful examination in differential diagnosis between benign and malignant gastric ulcer. However, it also has certain limitation which may be solved with more newer EUS applications and development.

Key Words::

• Differential diagnosis
• endoscopic ultrasound
• gastric ulcer

Declaration of interest: The authors report no conflicts of interest. The authors alone are responsible for the content and writing of the paper.