2004 Volume 46 Issue 3 Pages 291-302
Although APC has been utilized as one procedure of the endoscopic treatments for early gastric cancer, there are still few reports on histological effect of APC. It seems important to evaluate the histological effect of APC on early gastric cancer. This study was conducted on 6 patients of early gastric cancer with informed consents. We carried out APC for the lesions in all patients, and for the boundary area between early gastric cancer and normal mucosa in 3 of 6 patients before operation. We examined 9 coagulated areas histologically from resected stomach. The average time of APC was 11.5 seconds for gastric cancer and was 9 seconds for the boundary area. APC lesions were observed as simply heat coagulation of gastric mucosa endoscopically. Histological observation revealed various depth of the damage from mucosal muscle layer to proper muscular layer. (mm: 1, superficial sm : 3, deep sm : 4, pm :1) One session of APC therapy may be efficient for mucosal or super ficial submucosal cancer, however, it is possible that perilous that one session of therapy could unexpectedly infuluence proper muscular layer.
