An investigation on the lymph node metastasis in gastric carcinoma

Objective: To investigate the lymph node metastases in gastric carcinoma and its clinical significance. Methods: A total of 1 176 lymph nodes were taken from 52 patients with average of 22.6 nodes per case had been assessed by clinicopathological hematoxylin-eosin (HE) staining and reverse transcriptase-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR). Hematoxylin-eosin (HE) staining expression was detected in 310 lymph nodes. 462 lymph nodes had been assessed by RT-PCR and 223 lymph nodes micrometastasis. The total metastatic rate was calculated. Binary logistic regression analysis was used to analyze the influence index of five clinicopathological factors on the No 8, 9 and other lymph node metastases which 25～50% metastatic rate had been assessed. Results: The metastases rate (75.7%) of No 6 group lymph node was the highest and seconded by No 3 group (72.9%) .The overall lymph node metastases (LNM) of 52 patients with gastric carcinoma was 48.3%. The depth of tumor invasion and tumor histiopathologic-classification and tumor location were main factors to influence the LNM rate (P0.05). Conclusions: The status of the depth of tumor invasion and tumor histiopathologic-classification and tumor location acts as independent indicating the necessity of further lymph node dissection and individualized treatment.