Adenocarcinoma esofágico y esófago de Barrett. Adenocarcinoma gástrico y Helicobacter pylori

In the last two decades, the incidence of esophageal cancer has progressively increased, especially that of adenocarcinomas localized in the esophagogastric junction. The incidence of gastric cancer has decreased in the last few decades, although this decrease shows wide geographical variations. Thus, the prevalence of gastric cancer continues to be high in countries such as Chile, Colombia and Ireland and this disease remains the most frequent neoplasm in both sexes in China and Japan. In the meeting of the American Gastroenterological Association, notable among all the studies presented on the prevention and treatment of esophageal and gastric cancer were the following contributions: the use of clinical practice guidelines for the prevention and surveillance of Barrett's esophagus (BE) should be improved; treatment with proton pump inhibitors does not seem to reduce the risk of esophageal cancer; endoscopic therapy of intramucosal cancer through complete mucosal resection is effective; Helicobacter pylori eradication prevents the development of metachronous gastric cancer in patients treated for a first intramucosal adenocarcinoma through endoscopic resection; the risk of developing gastric cancer is 6 times higher in patients with mucosa-associated lymphoid tissue (MALT) lymphoma than in the general population; and photodynamic therapy may be an alternative for the treatment of "invisible" gastric adenocarcinoma, which should be followed-up endoscopically.