Chemotherapy alone versus, surgery followed by chemotherapy for stage I/IIE large-cell lymphoma of the stomach

The optimal treatment of localized large-cell lymphoma of the stomach remains controversial. In particular, the role of surgical resection of the primary tumor needs to be clearly defined. We have reviewed all patients with a diagnosis of gastric lymphoma and treated in our institutions between 1988 and 1998. Patients fulfilling the following criteria were included in this study: (1) histologically proven large-cell lymphoma of the stomach; (2) adequate pathological materials and complete clinical information for analysis; (3) clinical stage I/II disease according to the Musshoff modification of Ann Arbor system; and (4) received primary chemotherapy alone with anthracycline- or anthracenedione-containing regimens (group A) or curative surgery followed by adjuvant chemotherapy (group B). There were 38 and 21 patients in group A and group B, respectively. All pertinent clinicopathologic features were similar between the two groups of patients, except that patients of group A had significantly more stage II-2 disease (P = 0.004). Of group A, among 36 patients who could be evaluated for response to chemotherapy, there were 29 complete and 1 partial responses, with an overall response rate of 83.3% (95% Cl, 71.1-95.5%). The projected 5-year relapse-free survival (RFS) and overall survival (OS) were 86.0% (95% Cl, 73.3-98.7%) and 72.6% (95% Cl, 57.0-88.2%), respectively. On the other hand, the projected 5-year RFS and OS of group B were 77.9% (95% Cl, 58.0-97.8%) and 77.8% (95% Cl, 57.9-97.7%), respectively, not significantly different from that of group A. Our data suggest that systemic chemotherapy alone may be a reasonable alternative treatment for stage I/II large-cell lymphoma of the stomach. Resection of the primary tumor before systemic chemotherapy does not appear to improve the cure rate of this group of patients. (C) 2000 Wiley-Liss, Inc.