The incidence of carcinoma of the gastric remnant.

Carcinoma of the gastric remnant (stump carcinoma) is defined as cancer that has developed in the remnant of the stomach when primary resection was carried out at least 5 years earlier and for benign disease. Little is known about the incidence of the disease. In several publications adequate calculation is missing and unfortunately in well-designed investigations considerable numbers of patients who are to be followed from the day of the resection until many years later are missing. Thus calculations are based on a group of selected patients. We succeeded in analyzing 97% of our patients in a period for over 26 years. Stump cancer occurred in 1.9%. In our opinion stump cancer is not an independent disease, but similar to cancer of the stomach. It seems that resection provides a decrease of the chance that eventually gastric cancer may arise.