ABSTRACT
The diagnosis of gastric cancer in young age group was sometimes missed .The operative risk in senile age group was high because of combined other organ diseases. We tried to determine the difference in their correct clinicopathologic features and the prognosis of young and senile patients with gastric cancer. Clinicopathologic characteristics and surgical results were compared in 40 senile gastric cancer patients who were aged 65 years or above, and in 48 young gastric cancer patients who were aged 40 years or less. In clinicopathologic features, the senile group was characterized by a high incidence of well differentiated adenocarcinoma and intestinal type by Lauren classification. The young age group was characterized by high incidence of undifferentiated type adenocarcinoma and diffuse type by Lauren classification . The others were unremarkable. When the survival rate was compared in all cases between young and senile group, the young age group showed a more favorable prognosis than the senile group, but without statistical difference ( P=0.0058 ) . Also, the survival rate according to UICC stage showed no statistical difference when the same stage of the two different groups were compared . Both group showed better survival in curative surgery cases than in noncurative surgery cases.Our findings ruled out any relationships between age and length of survival time in patients undergoing curative gastrectomy for gastric cancer.