Recent clinical trials of adjuvant therapy for gastric cancer in Japan have shown improved survival benefits, but the results have been considered controversial and have been viewed with some skepticism in the West. Until now, the efforts of Japanese surgical oncologists in multimodality therapy have not been fully understood because they have not been adequately reported in English. This volume now presents the experience and expertise of Japanese surgeons who utilize preoperative or intraoperative chemotherapy, or a combination of systemic and regional chemotherapy. Their collected work provides valuable insight in the Japanese perspective and success in treating gastric cancer. Included in the appendix is an extensive tabular analysis of the gastric cancer database at the Cancer Institute Hospital of Tokyo. Probably the largest such database in the world from a single institution, the analyses present the state of the art in treatment of gastric cancer.

Recent decades have seen remarkable advances in the treatment of upper gastrointestinal malignancies, i.e., adenocarcinoma and squamous cell carcinoma as well as gastrointestinal stromal and other rare tumors of the esophagus and stomach. While, historically, surgical resection has been the sole treatment for these tumors, multimodal therapies have meanwhile proven their efficacy. At present, pre- and postoperative chemotherapy and radiotherapy, targeted drug therapy, and stage-specific surgical approaches are all indispensable cornerstones of an individualized treatment for upper gastrointestinal malignancies. With such multimodal treatment, better outcomes comprising improved quality of life and prolonged survival have been achieved for patients. However, for many tumor entities and stages, the ideal combination and sequence of treatments is still being evaluated in clinical trials. Moreover, the value of novel approaches such as immunotherapy or robotic surgery remains a matter of research. In this Special Issue of Cancers, up-to-date original research, short communications, and comprehensive review articles on all modalities playing a role in the treatment of upper gastrointestinal malignancies have been published.

This book is a practical guide on how best to incorporate advanced radiation therapy techniques into the multimodality treatment of a wide range of gastrointestinal tumors, including esophageal cancer, gastric cancer, hepatobiliary malignancies (primary and metastatic liver tumors, intrahepatic, perihilar, and extrahepatic cholangiocarcinomas, and gallbladder cancer), pancreatic cancer, colorectal cancer, and carcinoma of the anal canal. Practical considerations when treating patients with external beam radiation therapy, intensity-modulated radiation therapy, particle therapy, and stereotactic body radiation therapy are clearly explained. Detailed attention is devoted to the safety and efficacy of radiotherapy in combination with current and emerging systemic therapies (chemotherapy, immunotherapy, and biologic agents), surgery, and ablative therapy, and the advantages and disadvantages of alternative treatment approaches for different tumor types are carefully evaluated. The book will benefit radiation oncologists, medical and surgical oncologists, medical physicists, medical dosimetrists, and other oncology professionals.

Although there has been a slow but steady decrease in incidence, gastric cancer remains the second leading cause of cancer death worldwide. Several aspects of the oncological and surgical management are still controversial and so gastric cancer represents a challenge for the surgeon. This book aims to delineate the state of the art in the surgical and oncological treatment of gastric cancer, describing the new TNM staging system, the extent of visceral resection and lymphadenectomy focusing on the different open and minimally invasive surgical techniques and discussing intraoperative chemohyperthermia and neoadjuvant and adjuvant treatment. Operative endoscopy and endoscopic ultrasonography are also discussed, as these now have an important role in both diagnostic work-up and palliative care of gastric cancer patients. Only a multidisciplinary approach involving the surgeon, gastroenterologist, and oncologist can produce the comprehensive and integrated overview that today constitutes a winning strategy for the optimization of results.What we hope we have achieved is a flexible, up-to-date, exhaustive publication, rich in illustrations and consistent with evidence-based medicine.