No changing trends in incidence of gastric cardia cancer in Korea.

Although there is a controversy, several reports have shown that gastric cardia cancer has tended upwards in recent years. The aim of this study was to investigate the changing trend of stomach cancer according to the location of cancer and histologic type in Korea, where is known to be one of the most prevalent areas for gastric cancer. All the patients newly diagnosed as gastric cancer from 1991 through 2000 were recruited in Hallym University Medical Center. The periods were divided into the first (1991 through 1995) and the second (1996 through 2000) period. We analyzed the characteristics of cancer in the aspects of age, sex, tumor locations (cardia and non-cardia), and tumor grade of differentiation (well, moderate, and poor differentiated type). The number of cases was 2,395 and that of cardia cancer was 158 (6.6%). There was no evidence about the changes in the incidence of cardia cancer and histologic differentiation between two periods. The development of cardia cancer was not associated with the factors of age and sex with having no difference in the point of tumor grade. We could not find an upward tendency of cardia cancer development in recent 10 yr in Korea.