What is stomach cancer?
First of all, let’s introduce the stomach to you. It is located in the middle of esophagus and small intestine in the abdominal cavity, and can be subdivided into esophagogastric junction, fundus, gastric body, sinus and pylorus from top to bottom. The stomach wall is composed of different layers, the innermost layer is the mucosal layer, which is the main structure of the gland, and the outer layer is the submucosal layer, the muscular layer and the plasma layer in order.
Gastric cancer is a type of tumor that originates from the stomach wall, while the majority of gastric cancers originate from the glands and are therefore called adenocarcinomas. The gastric cancer we present here refers to gastric adenocarcinoma only, excluding other types of gastric cancer such as gastric lymphoma, gastric mesenchymal tumor and neuroendocrine tumor. These tumors are distinctly different from the common gastric cancer because of their different origins and are not discussed here.
Is the incidence of gastric cancer high?
Worldwide, gastric cancer is most common in East Asia, South America and Eastern Europe, and nearly half of the patients come from China. 98.9 million new cases of gastric cancer were diagnosed worldwide in 2008, and China accounted for 46.8% of the total number of deaths from gastric cancer in the same period. In China, compared with other malignant tumors, stomach cancer has the second highest incidence rate and the third highest mortality rate, which shows that stomach cancer is a disease that deserves our attention.
The incidence of gastric cancer shows an increasing trend with age, about 2/3 of gastric cancer patients are over 65 years old, and most of them are men, and men are about twice as likely to suffer from gastric cancer as women.
How to prevent the occurrence of stomach cancer?
By understanding the risk factors of stomach cancer and paying attention to some undesirable factors in daily life, it is possible to prevent the occurrence of stomach cancer. So, what should be done for different risk factors?
1. How to prevent the risk of H. pylori infection?
If you have symptoms of stomach discomfort, such as nausea, vomiting, bloating, acid reflux, belching, heartburn, etc., you need to go to the hospital early instead of just taking some “stomach medicine”.
In the hospital, your doctor will perform a gastroscopy or a breath test for H. pylori based on your symptoms, and sometimes take a little tissue for pathological examination to determine if the H. pylori infection is causing the discomfort. If the presence of H. pylori is confirmed, your doctor will recommend some medication, usually mainly antibiotics, that will usually cure you after 2 to 4 weeks of treatment.
But if there is no discomfort and only a chronic H. pylori infection is found during a routine physical examination, should you take medication to treat it? There is no uniform answer. Some early studies have shown that taking antibiotics in such patients can reduce the incidence of precancerous lesions in the stomach and perhaps reduce the risk of gastric cancer. But not all studies have come to the same conclusion. What exactly should be done should also be done according to each individual’s different situation and go to consult a doctor.
2.How to prevent stomach cancer by improving lifestyle habits?
In fact, in western developed countries, the incidence of stomach cancer has gradually decreased. This is attributed to the improvement of diet and living habits. For example, people used to preserve food by pickling, but now with refrigerators to store food, people consume less pickles or sauerkraut or smoked fish or bacon.
In addition, according to the recommendation of nutrition experts, increasing the intake of fresh fruits and vegetables and decreasing the intake of deeply processed red meat foods have also reduced the risk of stomach cancer. However, unlike the West, Chinese people are supposed to eat mainly grains and vegetables. They only need to pay attention to not choosing too many refined grains, avoiding high-salt and preserved foods, as well as paying attention to the freshness of foods and avoiding moldy foods.
Some people are keen to take vitamins, thinking that these “pills” will reduce the risk of cancer. Some studies suggest that antioxidants such as vitamins A and C and some minerals may reduce the risk of stomach cancer in people who are malnourished, but for people in good nutritional status who are not deficient in these vitamins, there is no benefit to taking these extra pills. Also, there are some small studies suggesting that drinking tea, especially green tea, may have a protective effect on the stomach, but most large-scale studies have not endorsed this conclusion.
Also, exercising properly, controlling caloric intake, and maintaining a normal weight are also good lifestyles to avoid cancer, and some studies have shown that people who exercise regularly may reduce the risk of stomach cancer by half. However, excessive weight control and being underweight is also bad, as it may increase the risk of other cancers and bring about other health problems.
The most important precautions are not to smoke and to avoid excessive alcohol consumption. Without the stimulation of alcohol and tobacco, there will be less harm from chronic inflammation and infection in the stomach.
3.Is there any drug that can prevent stomach cancer?
Some studies suggest that the use of aspirin or non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs), such as ibuprofen or naproxen, may reduce the risk of gastric cancer, as well as the risk of colon polyps and colon cancer. But these drugs can also cause serious side effects. Long-term use can lead to life-threatening conditions such as bleeding in the stomach.
Therefore, most doctors will not prescribe these drugs to prevent cancer. Of course, if you do need to use such drugs for other reasons, there may be some additional benefits.
4.What should I do if I already have a high risk of genetic factors?
If you already have a family history of stomach cancer, or if you suspect a genetic abnormality, you should go to a hospital with an oncology center, or a genetics laboratory for genetic testing and genetic counseling. Although genetic factors cannot be changed, regular checkups can be conducted for high-risk people to detect suspicious cancer signs at an early stage for early diagnosis and treatment.
5.How to look at benign diseases related to gastric cancer?
As mentioned before, some benign diseases of the stomach may increase the risk of gastric cancer, so what should be done with these benign diseases? First of all, we should treat them correctly because they are benign diseases after all, and many of them may not become malignant in their lifetime, so there is no need to worry too much.
Secondly, it is important to try to treat these diseases as early as possible. Some diseases can be cured by taking medication alone, others may require gastroscopic surgery, and still others may require more major surgery. Overall, all of these diseases can be alleviated or cured by aggressive treatment to prevent their occurrence of stomach cancer.
How to detect stomach cancer early?
In Japan and parts of Korea, everyone over the age of 50 is recommended to be screened for gastric cancer and followed up based on the results of the screening. As a result, the early diagnosis rate of gastric cancer in Japan is high, having reached 50%, and the prognosis of gastric cancer has improved significantly.
In regions with high prevalence of gastric cancer in China, scholars have also conducted screening and related research on gastric cancer, but due to economic conditions, early screening of gastric cancer has not been carried out nationwide. Therefore, the early diagnosis rate of gastric cancer in China is not high. Then, how to achieve early detection of gastric cancer? For individuals, they should pay attention to the discomfort symptoms that may be caused by stomach cancer, and also consider factors such as genetic background and underlying diseases, and choose reasonable examinations for possible risk factors of stomach cancer under the guidance of doctors to strive for early detection of stomach cancer.
Common discomforts related to stomach cancer include the following: abdominal discomfort or abdominal pain; poor appetite; indigestion, acid reflux, heartburn; nausea, vomiting, etc. In order to detect stomach cancer at its early stage, it is necessary to pay attention to the danger signs issued by the body and go to the hospital for timely consultation and examination. However, sometimes, stomach cancer may not have any symptoms. Even if there are some symptoms, it may be difficult to distinguish it from many other benign diseases because these symptoms are so common. Therefore, it is important to have regular medical checkups even when there is no discomfort.
For those who already have risk factors, in addition to actively treating existing diseases, they should also undergo more frequent and regular regular checkups and corresponding treatment under the guidance of a specialist. In addition, people with a strong family history of gastric cancer can undergo preventive gastrectomy before the occurrence of gastric cancer. Of course, these are not things that ordinary people can do on their own and must follow the advice of an experienced specialist.
Gastroscopy is the preferred method to screen for gastric cancer. Gastroscopy can directly observe the morphological changes in the stomach and can take lesion tissues for biopsy examination, which enables the diagnosis rate of early gastric cancer to reach over 90%.