Diet and gastric cancer

Context: Gastric cancer is the fifth most common malignancy, with a high incidence in Eastern Asian countries. Diet is an important risk factor in the genesis of gastric cancer, and the fact that it is modifiable warrants it to be studied extensively in relation to various clinicopathological parameters of gastric cancer. Aims: The present study was undertaken to study the dietary habits (vegetarian/nonvegetarian) among gastric carcinoma patients in the Indian context. Materials and Methods: We studied 100 consecutive cases of gastric carcinoma excluding tumors at gastroesophageal junction. Clinical data regarding food habits in the patients were collected by personal enquiry. Pathological characteristics including size, site, gross appearance, Lauren's histological type, and the World Health Organization (WHO) histological type were noted. Data analysis was done using Chi-square test. Results: Sixty-nine percent of gastric cancer patients were vegetarians and 31% were nonvegetarians. Statistically significant association between nonvegetarian diet and gastric cancer location at the lesser curvature was found (P ≤ 0.001). No statistically significant association between diet and gross appearance, Lauren's, and WHO histological type of gastric cancer was found. Conclusions: For anatomical locations, most gastric cancers located at lesser curvature had been developed among nonvegetarian patients, whereas we did not observe diet to be related to gross appearance and histological type of gastric carcinoma.