For Healthcare Professionals: Clinical Updates in Stomach (Gastric) Cancer

Improvements in staging, advances in surgical technology, and enhanced appreciation for the heterogeneity of gastric cancer has led to significant progress in treating the disease in recent years.

Memorial Sloan-Kettering has one of the nation’s highest surgical volumes for this relatively rare cancer, performing approximately 100 gastrectomies annually (open and laparoscopic). Evidence indicates that our minimally invasive approach yields shorter hospital stays, decreased need for postoperative pain relief, fewer postsurgical complications, and rates of recurrence-free survival at 36-month follow-up similar to open surgery. We are also one of the few National Cancer Institute-designated cancer centers with a specific program in upper gastrointestinal tract cancers.

Patients with gastric cancer at Memorial Sloan-Kettering are treated by our multidisciplinary team of experts, which includes more than 20 physicians in such specialties as surgery, gastroenterology, radiology, pathology, and interventional and radiation oncology.