[Treatment strategy for the type IV gastric cancer--from the standpoint of the surgery].

From the standpoint of the surgery, the treatment strategy for the type IV gastric cancer (GC) was studied. Recently, the resected rate of type IV GC has been increasing, though the number of operated GC patients is decreasing. The five-year survival rate was about 20% in all and around 30% in the curatively resected pts. As a result of examination of our pts with type 4 GC, multimodality therapy including neoadjuvant chemotherapy and extended surgery is recommended for pts with P 0/CY 0 or P 0/CY 1 but without other remaining GC lesions. Palliative gastrectomy and postoperative chemotherapy are recommended if performed safely to prevent such symptoms in spite of unresectable metastasis for pts with urgent symptoms such as bleeding, stricture, pain or malnutrition. For pts with P 2/P 3 but without passage disturbance, intensive chemotherapy is selected. But the propriety for selection of reduction surgery for pts with P 2/P 3 is controversial. The results of the prospective randomized controlled study of reduction surgery in non-curative advanced gastric cancer by the Gastric Cancer Surgical Study Group in Japan Clinical Oncology Group (JCOG) are expected.