Brief Reports
Copyright ©The Author(s) 2004. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Gastroenterol. Sep 15, 2004; 10(18): 2727-2730
Published online Sep 15, 2004. doi: 10.3748/wjg.v10.i18.2727
Meta-analysis of intraperitoneal chemotherapy for gastric cancer
Da-Zhi Xu, You-Qing Zhan, Xiao-Wei Sun, Su-Mei Cao, Qi-Rong Geng
Da-Zhi Xu, You-Qing Zhan, Xiao-Wei Sun, Department of Abdominal Surgery, Cancer Center, Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou 510060, Guangdong Province, China
Su-Mei Cao, Department of Nasopharyngeal Cancer, Department of Clinical Epidemiology, Cancer Center, Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou 510060, Guangdong Province, China
Qi-Rong Geng, Department of Medical Oncology, Cancer Center, Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou 510060, Guangdong Province, China
Author contributions: All authors contributed equally to the work.
Supported by the Natural Science Foundation of Guangdong Province, No.20030245
Correspondence to: You-Qing Zhan, Department of Abdominal Surgery, Cancer Center, Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou 510060, Guangdong Province, China. yq_zhan@21cn.com
Telephone: +86-20-87343123
Received: January 2, 2004
Revised: January 6, 2004
Accepted: January 12, 2004
Published online: September 15, 2004
Abstract

AIM: To assess the efficacy and safety of intraperitoneal chemotherapy in patients undergoing curative resection for gastric cancer through literature review.

METHODS: Medline (PubMed) (1980-2003/1), Embase (1980-2003/1), Cancerlit Database (1983-2003/1) and Chinese Biomedicine Database (1990-2003/1) were searched. Language was restricted to Chinese and English. The statistical analysis was performed by RevMan4.2 software provided by the Cochrane Collaboration. The results were expressed with odds ratio for the categorical variables.

RESULTS: Eleven trials involving 1161 cases were included. The pooled odds ratio was 0.51, with a 95% confidence interval (0.40-0.65). Intraperitoneal chemotherapy may benefit the patients after curative resection for locally advanced gastric cancer, and the combination of intraperitoneal chemotherapy with hyperthermia or activated carbon particles may provide more benefits to patients due to the enhanced antitumor activity of drugs. Sensitivity analysis and fail-safe number suggested that the result was comparatively reliable. However, of 11 trials, only 3 studies were of high quality.

CONCLUSION: Intraperitoneal chemotherapy after curative resection for locally advanced gastric cancer may be beneficial to patients. Continuous multicenter, randomized, double blind, rigorously designed trials should be conducted to draw definitive conclusions.

Keywords: $[Keywords]