[Treatment and prognosis of stomach cancers in the population of the Cote d'Or's District (1976-1985)].

The present study on treatment and prognosis of gastric cancers is based on the data of the digestive tract cancer registry set up for the French department of Côte-d'Or. During the 1976-1985 period, 784 cases of gastric cancer were diagnosed. Resection for cure was performed in 41.3% of gastric cancers and that proportion remained the same during the course of the study period. Operative mortality was 18.5% after resection for cure and 26.7% after palliative surgery. The overall survival rate was 31.7% at 1 year, 17.0% at 3 years, and 13.0% at 5 years. Ten different criteria (personal data, histologic and therapeutic parameters) were studied in relation to survival. With the univariate analysis, the survival rates were related to age, duration of the symptoms, history of previous gastric ulcer, tumour location, stage of diagnosis and treatment. Only 4 aspects were of good prognosis according to the multivariate analysis (Cox model): extension limited to the gastric wall, resection for cure, duration of the symptoms and location to the antrum or the angulus. These results underline the fact that the prognosis of gastric cancer in a well-defined population remains poor. Because of its severity, gastric cancer still represents a major cancer problem.