High grade dysplasia: surveillance, mucosal ablation, or resection?

Barrett's esophagus is a common premalignant condition that results from chronic gastroesophageal reflux. High grade dysplasia in the metaplastic esophagus is thought to be the last step in the metaplasia-to-carcinoma sequence that characterizes this disease. The management of high grade dysplasia in Barrett's esophagus is controversial. Some investigators advocate a rigorous endoscopic surveillance program with biopsies, but this approach has been questioned because of its clinical impracticality, high cost, possibility of sampling errors, and difficulty demonstrating effectiveness on a reproducible basis. Others advocate mucosal ablative therapy to eradicate the dysplastic and metaplastic epithelium. This approach, still in its infancy, cannot be accepted as standard therapy at the present time because of limited follow-up, its questionable ability to completely eradicate the abnormal mucosa, the phenomenon of pseudoregression, and the patients require continued rigorous endoscopic surveillance. Esophagectomy, on the other hand, can be accomplished with a low mortality rate in these patients. We advocate this approach because a large number of them have invasive cancer in the esophagus despite a preoperative diagnosis of only high grade dysplasia. In addition, the 5-year survival is excellent even if invasive cancer is present, and these patients are liberated from rigorous endoscopic surveillance for the rest of their lives. For patients with high grade dysplasia in Barrett's esophagus who are poor operative risks, less invasive approaches such as mucosal ablation may play a role, but longer follow-up information is needed before this technique can be accepted even in this setting.