Sentinel Lymph Node Navigation Surgery for Early Gastric Cancer: Is It a Safe Procedure in Countries with Non-Endemic Gastric Cancer Levels? A Preliminary Experience.

Purpose: Early diagnosis of gastric cancer is still the exception in Western countries. In the East, as in Japan and Korea, this disease is an endemic disorder. More conservative surgical procedures are frequently performed in early gastric cancer cases in these countries where sentinel lymph node navigation surgery is becoming a safe option for some patients.

Lymph node metastasis in early gastric cancer.

Objective: to evaluate the incidence of lymph node metastasis in early gastric cancer, identifying risk factors for its development.

Methods: we conducted a prospective study of patients with gastric cancer admitted to the Section of the Esophago-Gastric Surgery of the Surgery of Service HUCFF-UFRJ, from January 2006 to May 2012.

Results: the rate of early gastric cancer was 16.

Minor gastric resections with modified lymphadenectomy in early gastric cancer with negative sentinel node.

Objective: To study the sentinel lymph node in early gastric cancer as a diagnostic method of unsuspected lymph node metastasis, which may allow the performance, in those with negative lymph nodes, of smaller gastric resections with limited lymphadenectomy.

Methods: We studied seven patients with early gastric cancer treated at the Hospital Universitário Clementino Fraga Filho, Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, from September 2008 to May 2011, who underwent sentinel lymph node exams, performed by intraoperative peritumoral endoscopic injection of patent blue dye.

Results: We found an average of three sentinel nodes per patient.

[Learning curve and iatrogenic injuries in laparoscopic cholecystectomies].

Objective: The aim of this study is to analyze surgeon's proficiency, based on the different aspects of his learning curve as a risk factor for iatrogenic biliary tract injuries associated with Laparoscopic Cholecystectomy.

Methods: a retrospective study was conducted using the report information from charts of patients January 1992 through December 2007; at Hospital Universitário Clementino Fraga Filho da Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro. Analysis from data collected from charts of 2285 patients who had undergone laparoscopic cholecystectomies.

[Women and surgeons].

The authors present the current view of the women in Surgery since the end of the XIX century until now. They discuss the difficulties they face when they choose Surgery as a career and the progress now achieved.

General surgery residency in Brasil - very far from real practice.

The author presents the Residency in General Surgery in Brazil from its inception, outlining its changes up to the present day. She discusses her doubts and thoughts about the best model for General Surgery residency programs and the declining demand for General Surgery as a career and the causes for such decline.