US EPA

5134980 

Technical Report 

Carcinoma of the colon and stomach: A review with comment on epidemiologic associations 

Macgregor, IL 

1974 

227 

8 

911-915 

HEEP COPYRIGHT: BIOL ABS. Epedemiological data support environmental factors as being important in the development of colonic and gastric cancer. With gastric cancer, apart from specific instances involving carcinogens such as benzpyrenes in smoked fish and coal soot, there has been little progress that can be acted on as a preventive measure. The importance of simple atrophic gastritis was emphasized, but the pathogenesis of this lesion is obscure. The importance of Japanese pickles, seaweed and bracken in the development of the high incidence of gastritis and gastric cancer in the Japanese in still speculative. Studies of cellular turnover in simple atrophic gastritis showed very rapid proliferation of the gastric mucosal cells. There was continued synthesis of DNA throughout the lifespan of the cells, instead of the normal repression of proliferative activities. This is interesting because of the increased malignant potential of these cells, but the nature of the transition of these cells into invasive cancer cells is not known. Environmental factors are important in the development of gastric cancer. The probable, long, latent interval between the operational environmental factors, the development of clinical disease and the changing factors in the environment hindered investigative progress. The gastric cancer associated with pernicious anemia seems related to atrophic gastritis rather than any measurable immunological factor.