Gastric Cancer Staging
Staging is a method of judging the progress of the cancer in a patient. That is, once doctors know how far along the cancer is, they can decide on the best course of treatment. The staging process looks at the tumor and the extent to which it has spread to other parts of the body. There are a number of aspects to staging.
A simplified approach puts patients into six groups or stages based on how far the cancer has advanced:
| Stage 0 | Cancer has just begun to affect the inner stomach. |
| Stage I | Cancer has begun to penetrate toward the outer layer of stomach. Nearby lymph nodes may be involved. |
| Stage II | Cancer has progressed farther through tissue layers of stomach or more distant lymph nodes may be involved. |
| Stage III | Cancer has penetrated all tissue layers of stomach or distant lymph nodes may be involved. |
| Stage IV | Cancer has affected nearby organs and tissues. Cancer may even have been carried through the lymph system to distant parts of the body. This is known as metastasis. |
| Recurrent | Patient with previous gastric cancer was cancer free, but cancer returned. |
Other staging approaches evaluate the tumor and its location and behavior in greater detail or classify it based on the most likely type of treatment.
Physician-developed and -monitored.
Original Date of Publication: 15 Aug 1999
Reviewed by: Toomas Sorra, M.D., F.A.C.G., Stanley J. Swierzewski, III, M.D.
Last Reviewed: 24 Aug 2008
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