What can someone with stomach cancer eat?

Written by Liu Liang
Oncology
Updated on September 09, 2024
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For the diet of stomach cancer patients, they should focus on eating easily digestible foods and maintain a balanced diet with frequent small meals. They can eat meat, eggs, vegetables, and fruits. However, they should avoid cancer-causing foods such as pickled products and barbecued foods, as well as overly greasy or hard-to-digest foods. There are no specific dietary prohibitions. As long as the patient has a good appetite and can tolerate food, they can eat many types of food.

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Written by Zhou Zi Hua
Oncology
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What are the symptoms of stomach cancer?

Gastric cancer can cause pain in the upper abdomen. If the condition gradually worsens, it can manifest as persistent pain, postprandial fullness and vomiting, belching, and lack of appetite; upper gastrointestinal bleeding, manifesting as vomiting blood, blood in the stool, and black stools; there can also be difficulty swallowing, weight loss and anemia. If bone metastasis occurs, it can manifest as bone pain and pain in the lower back. If a large amount of ascites appears, it can lead to abdominal distension, with shifting dullness detectable on percussion. If liver metastasis occurs, it can manifest as jaundice, and enlargement of the supraclavicular lymph nodes can also occur.

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Written by Liu Liang
Oncology
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Can stomach cancer be cured?

Whether gastric cancer can be cured depends on the stage of the cancer, as well as the patient's own physical condition. For example, early-stage gastric cancer patients, who are diagnosed as early-stage through examinations such as endoscopic ultrasonography and enhanced CT of the chest and abdomen, and assessed by surgeons as suitable for curative surgery, are primarily treated with curative surgery. The prognosis for these early-stage gastric cancer patients is generally good, with a relatively high five-year survival rate. Post-operation, based on the pathological findings, it is decided whether postoperative adjuvant radiotherapy and chemotherapy are necessary. There is hope for curing patients in these early stages through these treatment methods. However, if a patient is found to have advanced-stage gastric cancer, for example with metastases to distant organs like the liver and lungs, the cancer is not completely curable. The purpose of treatment in such cases is to alleviate the patient's pain and extend their survival, but it can’t achieve a curative effect.

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Written by Liu Liang
Oncology
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What are the symptoms of stomach cancer?

Symptoms of gastric cancer, especially in the early stages, generally include nausea, vomiting, loss of appetite, discomfort or bloating in the upper abdomen, pain, and acid reflux as some of the gastrointestinal symptoms, as well as vomiting blood and black stools. Black stools are tar-like stools, and their occurrence indicates bleeding in the upper gastrointestinal tract. Additionally, if the tumor causes pyloric obstruction, the patient will vomit food eaten the night before, be completely unable to eat, and experience a significant weight loss. In even more advanced stages, gastric cancer patients may develop a cachectic state.

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Written by Liu Liang
Oncology
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Symptoms of gastric cancer

Symptoms of gastric cancer include nausea, vomiting, acid reflux, pain in the upper abdomen, and a sense of fullness and discomfort, especially after eating, which are some of the early symptoms. As the tumor progresses, symptoms can worsen, including pain, vomiting of blood, and black stools indicating upper gastrointestinal bleeding. If the tumor is near the pylorus, it can cause pyloric obstruction, which manifests as acid reflux followed by vomiting of undigested food from the previous night. In the late stages of gastric cancer, patients may experience fatigue, weight loss, severe cachexia, and anemia. These are symptoms of advanced gastric cancer.

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Written by Liu Liang
Oncology
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Late-stage symptoms of gastric cancer

The common late-stage symptoms of gastric cancer patients include nausea, vomiting, and even a complete inability to eat. There are also symptoms related to the digestive tract such as pain in the upper abdomen and acid reflux, as well as upper gastrointestinal bleeding, such as vomiting blood and melena which are signs of lower gastrointestinal bleeding. Late-stage gastric cancer patients may also experience organ metastasis, leading to corresponding symptoms. For example, metastasis of gastric cancer to the liver can cause abdominal pain and ascites due to hepatic metastatic tumors. Clinical manifestations caused by such metastatic tumors also include metastasis to retroperitoneal lymph nodes in the abdominal cavity, a common site of spread for gastric cancer. Patients may even show symptoms of intestinal obstruction, such as abdominal pain, bloating, nausea, vomiting, inability to pass stool, or even absence of flatus, which are indicators of intestinal obstruction. Consequently, patients might experience weight loss and deteriorate into a cachectic state, marked by poor nutrition and significant weight loss, which are characteristic symptoms of late-stage patients.