[Clinical features of 50 cases of primary gastric lymphoma].

OBJECTIVE

To analyze the clinical characteristics of primary gastric lymphoma (PGL) and to improve its diagnosis and treatment.

METHODS

The clinical manifestations, diagnosis, treatments and history of 50 PGL patients, who were hospitalized from September 2005 to September 2009, were reviewed and analyzed.

RESULTS

The main manifestation of PGL was epigastric pain with infrequent systemic symptoms, such as stomach ache, abdominal discomfort, vomit, black stool, loss of appetite, fever, feeble, and skinny. Pathological examination indicated that only 1 patient had T cell lymphoma while the rest 49 had B cell lymphoma. Fourteen had mucosa-associated lymphoid tissue lymphoma (MALT), 35 had diffuse large B cell lymphoma (DLBCL), and 2 had both DLBCL and MALT (DLBCML). All the 50 patients received chemotherapy, and 12 underwent surgical treatment besides chemotherapy. Fourteen out of the 49 patients with B cell lymphoma received rituximab together with chemotherapy, and 35 received chemotherapy alone. The 2-year survival rate in the patients receiving rituximab together with chemotherapy was higher than that in the patients receiving chemotherapy alone (85.7% vs 77.1%, P< 0.05). The 2-year survival rate in patients of clinical stage I-II was higher than that in patients of clinical stage III-IV (90.9% vs 71.4%, P< 0.05).

CONCLUSION

The main clinical manifestation of PGL patients is non-specific gastrointestinal symptoms, among which abdominal pain is most common. The clinical examination mainly relies on pathological examinations, and the most common pathological type of primary gastric lymphoma is DLBCL. The main treatment is chemotherapy, and the prognosis is related to the clinical stage and the use of rituximab. After the treatment, the 2-year survival rate in the 50 patients reaches 80.0%.