Late mortality after partial gastrectomy.

A 10-year prospective study of Hawaii Japanese males with partial gastrectomy shows that the age-adjusted mortality rates in men with partial gastrectomy were slightly higher than in those with an intact stomach, but the difference failed to achieve statistical significance. This excess of mortality is due, in part, to excess smoking by men who had ulcers of the stomach. Although death due to stroke and lung cancer showed the most substantial deviations from the base population, this can be attributed only in part to the tendency of men with these diseases to be smokers. Other factors, possibly related to nutrition, also contribute to the increased risk of mortality from these diseases. Death from coronary heart disease, an illness with a substantial association with smoking in men with an intact stomach was less frequent in men with gastrectomy but the difference was not statistically significant. It would appear that men with partial gastrectomy had other characteristics that weakened the impact of smoking upon coronary disease risk--low blood pressure, low serum cholesterol, low body weight and increased alcohol consumption.