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Background and Objectives: Following gastric and esophageal cancer surgery, patients often experience significant, prolonged eating-related symptoms. One promising approach to help patients improve their eating-related quality of life (QOL) is through self-management coaching to aid in diet modification. We performed a randomized pilot study of a nutritionist-led telehealth intervention for the self-management of eating after gastroesophageal cancer surgery., Methods: Patients who were within 30 days of resuming oral intake after undergoing surgery for gastric and/or esophageal cancer were consented and then randomized to the intervention or usual care. The intervention was performed by a nutritionist trained in self-management coaching and delivered in four telehealth sessions over 4 months. The following outcomes were measured at baseline and at 6 months after baseline: QOL (EORTC QLQC30), weight, body mass index, and sarcopenia., Results: Fifty-three patients were enrolled. 22/27 usual care and 21/26 intervention patients completed the study for a retention rate of 81%. Differences between the intervention and control groups were not statistically significant, but the intervention group had indications of greater improvements in overall QOL as measured by EORTC QLQC30 Summary Score (8.7 vs. 2.3, p = 0.17) as well as greater improvements in 4/5 functional domains (p > 0.3). The intervention group also had slightly more weight gain (6 kg vs. 3 kg, p = 0.3) and less sarcopenia (3/16 vs. 9/18, p = 0.07)., Conclusions: This pilot study demonstrated the feasibility and acceptability of a telehealth intervention for self-management of eating symptoms after gastroesophageal cancer surgery. There were trends toward improved overall QOL in the intervention group. A larger study is needed to validate the results., (© 2023 The Authors. Journal of Surgical Oncology published by Wiley Periodicals LLC.)

Background: Esophagojejunostomy after minimally invasive total gastrectomy (MITG) for gastric cancer (GC) is technically challenging. Failure of the esophagojejunal anastomosis can lead to significant morbidity, leading to short- and long-term quality of life (QoL) impairment or mortality. The optimal reconstruction method following MITG remains controversial. We evaluated outcomes of minimally invasive esophagojejunostomy after laparoscopic or robotic total gastrectomies., Methods: We retrospectively reviewed MITG patients between 2015 and 2020 at two high-volume centers in China and the United States. Eligible patients were divided into groups by different reconstruction methods. We compared clinicopathologic characteristics, postoperative outcomes, including complication rates, overall survival rate (OS), disease-free survival rate (DFS), and patient-reported QoL., Results: GC patients (n = 105) were divided into intracorporeal esophagojejunostomy (IEJ, n = 60) and extracorporeal esophagojejunostomy (EEJ, n = 45) groups. EEJ had higher incidence of wound infection (8.3% vs 13.3%, P = 0.044) and pneumonia (21.7% vs 40.0%, P = 0.042) than IEJ. The linear stapler (LS) group was inferior to the circular stapler (CS) group in reflux [50.0 (11.1-77.8) vs 44.4 (0.0-66.7), P = 0.041] and diarrhea [33.3 (0.0-66.7) vs 0.0 (0.0-66.7), P = 0.045] while LS was better than CS for dysphagia [22.2 (0.0-33.3) vs 11.1 (0.0-33.3), P = 0.049] and eating restrictions [33.3 (16.7-58.3) vs 41.7 (16.7-66.7), P = 0.029] at 1 year. OS and DFS did not differ significantly between LS and CS., Conclusions: IEJ anastomosis generated better results than EEJ. LS was associated with a better patient eating experience, but more diarrhea and reflux compared with CS. Clinical and patient-reported outcomes show the superiority of IEJ with the LS reconstruction method in MITG for GC., (© 2023. The Author(s).)

Despite the use of first-line therapies like fluoropyrimidine and platinum-based cytotoxic chemotherapy, gastric cancer (GC) continues to carry a poor prognosis. Recent subgroup analyses of first-line phase III trials have demonstrated that patients with microsatellite instability-high (MSI-H) metastatic GC derive significant improvement in survival rates when immune checkpoint inhibitors (ICIs) are combined with chemotherapy compared with chemotherapy alone. However, it remains to be seen whether the success of ICIs in the metastatic setting can be translated into earlier stages of GC with resectable disease. We report 6 cases of locally advanced, nonmetastatic MSI-H GC that all demonstrated favorable response following treatment with pembrolizumab in addition to neoadjuvant chemotherapy. With the exception of immune-related colitis in one patient, pembrolizumab was well-tolerated. To our knowledge, this is the first reported US case series of patients treated with an ICI in combination with neoadjuvant chemotherapy for advanced, nonmetastatic, resectable or unresectable MSI-H GC.

Introduction: Gastric carcinoid is a rare entity with complex management options. This study aims to determine if surgical intervention in patients with local, regional, and metastatic gastric carcinoid is associated with prolonged survival., Materials and Methods: The California Cancer Registry merged with the California Office of Statewide Health Planning and Development was queried for patients with a diagnosis of gastric carcinoid (2000 to 2011). Clinicopathologic characteristics, management, and outcomes were evaluated., Results: There were 1012 patients with a diagnosis of gastric carcinoid identified. The median age was 63 (range, 18 to 99) and the majority of patients were women (615, 60.7%). Most patients had localized disease (644, 64%), whereas 9.4% (95) had regional and 13.4% (133) had distant metastases at diagnosis. The majority of patients underwent gastric surgery (56.7%, n=574 vs. 43.2%, n=438). Prolonged survival was associated with gastric surgery in patients with both local (median survival not reached; P<0.0001) and regional disease (27 mo with surgery vs. 5 mo with no surgery; P=0.0007). In patients who underwent gastrectomy and resection of hepatic metastasis, the survival approached those patients who had surgery for only regional disease (26 vs. 27 mo, P=0.8721)., Conclusions: Although the biology of the disease is the most significant predictor of overall outcome, when technically feasible and where comorbidities allow, aggressive endoscopic or surgical intervention should be offered for local and locoregional diseases, respectively.

Importance: Hyperthermic intraperitoneal chemotherapy (HIPEC) has been used within various multimodality strategies for the prevention and treatment of gastric cancer peritoneal carcinomatosis., Objective: To systematically evaluate the role of HIPEC in gastric cancer and clarify its effectiveness at different stages of peritoneal disease progression., Data Sources: Medline and Embase databases between January 1, 1985 and June 1, 2016., Study Selection: Randomised control trials and high-quality non-randomised control trials selected on a validated tool (methodological index for non-randomised studies) comparing HIPEC and standard oncological management for the treatment of advanced stage gastric cancer with and without peritoneal carcinomatosis were considered., Data Extraction and Synthesis: A random-effects network meta-analysis., Main Outcomes and Measures: The primary outcomes were overall survival and disease recurrence. Secondary outcomes were overall complications, type of complications, and sites of recurrence., Results: A total of 11 RCTs and 21 non-randomised control trials (2520 patients) were included. For patients without the presence of peritoneal carcinomatosis (PC), the overall survival rates between the HIPEC and control groups at 3 or 5 years resulted in favour of the HIPEC group (risk ratio [RR] = 0.82, P = 0.01). No difference in the 3-year overall survival (RR = 0.99, P = 0.85) in but a prolonged median survival of 4 months in favour of the HIPEC group (WMD = 4.04, P < 0.001) was seen in patients with PC. HIPEC was associated with significantly higher risk of complications for both patients with PC (RR = 2.15, P < 0.01) and without (RR = 2.17, P < 0.01). This increased risk in the HIPEC group was related to systemic drugs toxicity. Anastomotic leakage rates were found to be similar between groups., Conclusions: Our study demonstrates a survival advantage of the use of HIPEC as a prophylactic strategy and suggests that patients whose disease burden is limited to positive cytology and limited nodal involvement may benefit the most from HIPEC. For patients with extensive carcinomatosis, the completeness of cytoreductive surgery is a critical prognostic factor for survival. Future RCTs should better define patient selection criteria., (Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.)

Background: Gastric adenocarcinoma is an aggressive disease with frequent lymph node (LN) metastases for which lymphadenectomy results in a survival benefit. In the US, the National Comprehensive Cancer Network guidelines recommend D2 lymphadenectomy or a minimum of 15 LNs retrieved. However, retrieval of only 15 LNs is considered by most international guidelines as inadequate. We sought to evaluate the survival benefits associated with a more complete lymphadenectomy., Study Design: An international database was constructed by combining gastric cancer cases from the Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results program database (n = 13,932) and the Yonsei University Gastric Cancer database (n = 11,358) (total n = 25,289). Kaplan-Meier survival analysis was performed along with Joinpoint analysis to obtain the optimal number of LNs to retrieve based on survival. Prognostic significance of number of nodes retrieved was then confirmed with univariate and multivariate analyses., Results: Analysis for both mean and median survival yielded 29 LNs removed as the Joinpoint. This was confirmed with multivariate analysis, where 15 retrieved LNs cutoff fell out of the model and 29 retrieved LNs remained intact, with a hazard ratio of 0.799 (95% CI 0.759 to 0.842; p < 0.001). Stage-stratified Kaplan-Meier analysis for a cutoff point of 29 LNs also demonstrated a statistically significant improvement in survival., Conclusions: Joinpoint analysis has allowed for the creation of a model demonstrating the point at which additional dissection would not provide additional benefit. This large international dataset analysis demonstrates that the maximal survival advantage is seen by performing a lymphadenectomy with a minimum of 29 LNs retrieved., (Copyright © 2016 American College of Surgeons. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)