Minute lesions of esophageal cancer.

Fifty-four cases of minute esophageal cancer (1 cm or less in the greatest dimension) were collected and analyzed. Of these 67% were mucosal cancer and 28% were submucosal cancer. Prognosis was anticipated to be good as there was only one case of lymph node metastasis and three of vascular invasion. A lesion of 1 cm can be regarded as curable regardless of its depth of invasion. The endoscopic approach with use of a dye staining technique is useful for detection of or screening for minute esophageal cancer.