STROBE-clinical characteristics and prognosis factors of gastric cancer in young patients aged ≤30 years

We aimed to determine the clinical characteristics and prognosis factors of young patients with gastric cancer (GC). A total of 101 young patients with GC referred to Zhengzhou University People's Hospital, Henan province, China between January 1st, 2003 and June 1st, 2015 were retrospectively reviewed. The medical records included ages, genders, marital status, family history of tumors, comorbidity, Helicobacter pylori (H.pylori) infection, fibrinogen, prealbumin, alpha-fetoprotein (AFP), carcinoembryonic antigen (CEA), tumor location, tumor size, TNM stage, differentiation of the tumor, WHO type, treatment method and prognostic factors effect were further assessed. The mean age of GC patients in our group was 26.0 years. The incidence was slightly higher in females (female: male = 1.1:1). Some patients had the family history of tumor and H.pylori infection (2.0%, 6.9%). The tumor sizes were mainly under 5 cm (52.4%) and the most locations were in the antrum (43.5%) and body (42.5%). A large number of patients were diagnosed as adenocarcinomas (66.3%) and the main histological of GC was poor differentiated (72.3%). Moreover, a high proportion of patients were diagnosed at the stages III-IV (61.4%), and most patients received surgery combined chemotherapy (63.4%), however, the survival outcome was poor. In univariate Cox analysis, tumor sizes, TNM stage were significantly associated with overall survival (OS) and the multivariate Cox analysis demonstrated that TNM stage was significantly associated with OS. GC in young patients has its unique biological and clinical features. A large majority of young patients were diagnosed at their advanced stages with poor prognostic. TNM stage was an independent prognostic factor for young patients with GC, early GC screening in young people should be actively promoted.