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Canadian Journal of Surgery logoLink to Canadian Journal of Surgery
. 1999 Oct;42(5):371–376.

Borrmann’s type IV gastric cancer: clinicopathologic analysis

Takashi Yokota 1,, Shin Teshima 1, Toshihiro Saito 1, Shu Kikuchi 1, Yasuo Kunii 1, Hidemi Yamauchi 1
PMCID: PMC3788904  PMID: 10526523

Abstract

Objective

To determine whether there is a specific pattern of clinicopathological features that could distinguish Borrmann’s type IV gastric cancer from other types of gastric cancer.

Design

A retrospective study of patients with advanced gastric cancer treated between 1985 and 1995.

Setting

The Department of Surgery, Sendai National Hospital, a 716-bed teaching hospital.

Patients

The clinicopathologic features of 88 patients with Borrmann’s type IV carcinoma of the stomach were reviewed from the database of gastric cancer. The results were compared with those of 309 patients with other types of gastric carcinoma.

Main outcome measures

Gender, age, tumour size, depth of invasion, histologic type, cancer–stromal relationship, histologic growth pattern, nodal involvement, lymphatic and vascular invasion, type of operation, cause of death and 5-year survival.

Results

Women were afflicted as commonly as men in the Borrmann’s type IV group. These patients tended to be younger and to have larger tumours involving the entire stomach than patients with other types of cancer. Histologic type was commonly diffuse and scirrhous, and serosal invasion was prominent with infiltrative growth. Nodal involvement and lymphatic invasion were more common in patients with Borrmann’s type IV than in those with other types of gastric cancer. The disease was advanced in most instances and a total gastrectomy was performed in 55% of the patients. The survival rate of patients with Borrmann’s type IV tumour was lower than for patients with other types of gastric cancer ( p < 0.005, log-rank test).

Conclusions

In Borrmann’s type IV gastric cancer, early detection and curative resection are crucial to extend the patient’s survival. Aggressive postoperative chemotherapy is recommended when a noncurative resection is performed.

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