Prognosis of Conversion Gastrectomy Cases for Stage IV Gastric Cancer

BACKGROUND: We evaluated the efficacy of surgical resection following response to primary chemotherapy for prospective registered Stage IV gastric cancer patients. PATIENTS AND METHODS: We analyzed the details and prognosis of 6 patients having advanced gastric cancer clinically diagnosed as resectable following primary chemotherapy between 2011 and 2015. RESULTS: The reason for being diagnosed as unresectable before chemotherapy was metastasis to distant sites, including paraaortic lymph node metastasis in 3 cases, peritoneal metastasis in 2 cases, and liver metastasis in 1 case.Two patients were able to undergo R0 resection, and the remaining 4 patients were unable to undergo complete resection.The median survival time (MST)of the patients who underwent R0 resection was 567.5 days, and the MST of the patients who could not undergo R0 resection was 474 days. CONCLUSION: Careful consideration of conversion gastrectomy may be important in inducing longterm survival in clinical Stage IV gastric cancer patients.