Table 2.

Clinical characteristics of the stomach cancer cases entered in the population-based cancer registry of Valdivia 1998-2002 (n = 529)

Characteristic	Cases	Total (%)	Males (%)	Females (%)	P-value sex diff.
Sign and symptoms at diagnosis
Weight loss	294	55.6	61.1	43.3	< 0.001
Epigastric pain	285	53.9	57.0	47.0	0.03
Gastrointestinal bleeding	108	20.4	21.4	18.3	0.42
Vomiting	106	20.0	20.8	18.3	0.50
Abdominal distension	83	15.7	14.8	17.7	0.40
Palpable epigastric mass	56	14.7	12.9	19.2	0.016
Ascites	51	13.4	13.3	13.5	0.97
Supraclavicular adenopathy	31	8.5	9.7	5.1	0.16
Main detection source
Histological studies1	404	76.4	81.3	65.2	< 0.001
Radiological diagnosis	25	4.7	4.9	4.3	0.74
Clinical or autopsy	39	7.3	7.2	7.9	0.75
Only death certificate	61	11.5	6.6	22.6	< 0.001
Duration of symptoms2
< 3 mo	126	32.9	35.9	24.2	0.033
3 to 6 mo	98	25.6	25.4	26.3	0.86
> 6 mo	159	41.5	38.7	49.5	0.06
Main diagnostic workout
Gastric endoscopy	412	79.4	84.6	67.7	< 0.001
Gastric biopsy	401	75.8	80.8	64.6	< 0.001
Ecography	191	36.1	37.8	32.3	0.22
Computed tomography	114	21.6	22.7	18.9	< 0.001
Staging TNM
Stage I	9	1.7	2.2	0.6	0.19
Stage II	20	3.8	2.5	6.7	0.02
Stage III	53	10.0	10.4	9.1	0.65
Stage IV	297	56.1	58.6	50.6	0.09
Not determined	150	28.4	26.3	32.9	0.12
Histological type
Tubular adenocarcinoma	148	36.0	35.2	38.3	0.56
Tubulopapillary adenocarcinoma	35	8.5	7.6	11.2	0.25
Papillary adenocarcinoma	11	2.7	2.0	4.7	0.14
Mucinous adenocarcinoma	11	2.7	2.3	3.7	0.43
Undefined adenocarcinoma	83	20.2	22.4	14.0	0.06
Signet ring cell carcinoma	77	18.7	18.1	20.6	0.57
Non Hodgkin lymphoma	6	1.5	1.6	0.9	0.60
Neuroendocrine carcinoma	4	1.0	0.7	1.9	0.27
Other carcinoma	36	8.8	9.5	6.5	0.35
Tumor location
Body	57	10.8	11.5	9.1	0.42
Fundus	158	29.9	33.7	21.3	0.004
Antrum	122	23.1	21.9	25.6	0.35
All stomach	33	6.2	6.8	4.9	0.39
Unknown	159	30.1	26.0	39.0	0.003
Habits
Tobacco use	346	44.8	51.4	29.1	< 0.001
Alcohol use	338	61.2	73.6	31.3	< 0.001

¹Includes 3 cases diagnosed based on a biopsy of metastasis;

²Time between first symptoms and diagnosis.