Endoscopic upper gastrointestinal polypectomy. Report of 73 polypectomies in 63 patients.

Seventy-three upper gastrointestinal endoscopic polypectomies were performed in 63 patients over a period of five years. Thiry-eight patients (52%) had adenomatous polyps, two of which contained carcinoma in situ and 26 (36%) were inflammatory in nature. Four lesions were removed from the duodenum. Hemodynamically significant hemorrhage occurred in five cases and persistent symptomatic ulcer in three cases. All complications occurred early in the series and responded to conservative measures. There was no mortality or need for surgical intervention in any case. It was concluded that: 1. upper gastrointestinal tract endoscopic polypectomy is a safe and relatively simple procedure; 2. postprocedural complications can be markedly reduced by prophylactic conservative antiulcer therapy and 3. especially in the area of adenomatous polyps, excision of the entire lesion is superior to biopsy in the detection of early malignancy.