[The metastatic patterns of gastric cancer from its histopathological characteristics in the primary lesion--particularly in relation to peritoneal dissemination and liver metastases].

The purpose of this study was to catagorize the metastatic patterns of advanced gastric cancer into liver and peritoneal metastases from the stromal behavior of the primary lesion in 278 patients. According to our data, peritoneal disseminations were encountered 5.0% of the medullary type, 30.0% of the intermediate type and 38.0% of the scirrhous type, while the corresponding figures for liver metastases were 28.8%, 6.0% and 1.9%, respectively. The differences among the three types were significant with both patterns of metastasis. From the present data, we assume that the histological pattern in the stroma of primary gastric cancer shows the biological behavior of cancer growth and metastatic patterns, particularly in close relation to peritoneal dissemination and liver metastases.