Two percent to fifteen percent of patients with gastric cancer (GC) are younger than 45 years of age and there has been an increase in the relative proportion of young age GC compared with older age GC, especially in young females. The question of whether young age GC is different from that of older patients has been raised but remains unresolved.
A research article to be published on January 14, 2010 the World Journal of Gastroenterology addresses this question. The research team from South Korea enrolled, retrospectively, a total of 3242 patients with GC between 18 and 45 years of age and 3000 sex- and age-matched controls. Their study demonstrated that the epidemiologic characteristics including risk factors of young age GC were different according to age and gender. Hormonal factors were more commonly associated with females, particularly in the younger age group, whereas environmental factors were more commonly associated with males, particularly in the older age group.
This knowledge may help to clarify the exact pathophysiology of young age GC and help devise an appropriate treatment approach.
Reference: Chung HW, Noh SH, Lim JB. Analysis of demographic characteristics in 3242 young age gastric cancer patients in Korea. World J Gastroenterol 2010; 16(2): 256-263
http://www.wjgnet.com/1007-9327/16/256.asp
Correspondence to: Dr. Jong-Baeck Lim, MD, PhD, Department of Laboratory Medicine, Yonsei University College of Medicine, 134 Shinchon-dong, Seodaemun-gu, 120-752 Seoul, South Korea. jlim@yuhs.ac
Telephone: +82-2-22282447 Fax: +82-2-3641583
About World Journal of Gastroenterology
World Journal of Gastroenterology (WJG), a leading international journal in gastroenterology and hepatology, has established a reputation for publishing first class research on esophageal cancer, gastric cancer, liver cancer, viral hepatitis, colorectal cancer, and H pylori infection and provides a forum for both clinicians and scientists. WJG has been indexed and abstracted in Current Contents/Clinical Medicine, Science Citation Index Expanded (also known as SciSearch) and Journal Citation Reports/Science Edition, Index Medicus, MEDLINE and PubMed, Chemical Abstracts, EMBASE/Excerpta Medica, Abstracts Journals, Nature Clinical Practice Gastroenterology and Hepatology, CAB Abstracts and Global Health. ISI JCR 2008 IF: 2.081. WJG is a weekly journal published by WJG Press. The publication dates are the 7th, 14th, 21st, and 28th day of every month. WJG is supported by The National Natural Science Foundation of China, No. 30224801 and No. 30424812, and was founded with the name of China National Journal of New Gastroenterology on October 1, 1995, and renamed WJG on January 25, 1998.
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World Journal of Gastroenterology