It is obvious in a critical comparative survey of the literature on gastric carcinoma that there is a wide variation in the published five-year survival rates. Thus, the reported rates expressed in terms of five-year survivors range from a low of 0.7% to a high of 35%.1-4,6,8,9 Some of the factors causing this marked disparity, such as differences in methods of reporting results are evident. Other factors, such as the involuntary selection which occurs as a result of the inherent nature of the institution reporting its data, are subtler.
The present study provides a rather unique opportunity to compare the results in patients with gastric carcinoma treated in three widely different types of institutions: a Government institution, represented by the Veterans' Administration Hospital, Dearborn, Mich.; a city institution, represented by the Receiving Hospital of the City of Detroit, and a private hospital, represented by the two units of the