Postoperative complications after local resection of the stomach

Local resection of the stomach for early gastric cancer is being performed more frequently, despite which no report focusing on the postoperative complications has been published. The purpose of this study was to investigate the incidence and factors affecting postoperative complications after local resection of the stomach. Local resection of the stomach was performed in 37 patients with gastric cancers, submucosal tumors (SMT), or bleeding gastric ulcers, 24 of whom underwent gastroscopy at least once after their operation. We retrospectively examined the complications and background relating to the operations performed in those 24 patients. Postoperative hemorrhage occurred in 2 patients, an open ulcer developed on the suture line in 2 and leakage developed in 1. The hemorrhage and open ulcer were observed only when wide resection with regional lymph node dissection was performed for early gastric cancers in the middle third of the stomach. These findings show that the possibility of postoperative hemorrhage and open ulcers on the suture line should be borne in mind, especially when wide local resection with lymph node dissection is performed for cancers in the middle part of the stomach.