{"entity":{"id":"gastric-endoscopic-screening","kind":"technology","name":"Gastric cancer endoscopic screening (East Asia)","aka":[],"tldr":"In Korea and Japan, where stomach cancer is common, adults have a camera examination of the stomach every two years, so most cancers are found early enough to remove through the endoscope.","summary":"Korea's National Cancer Screening Programme has offered biennial upper endoscopy (or barium X-ray) to everyone aged 40 and over since 1999, and Japan added endoscopy to its national guideline in 2016 for people aged 50 and over every two to three years. A Korean nested case-control study (Gastroenterology 2017) found that endoscopic screening was associated with a 47% reduction in gastric cancer mortality, and over half of Korean gastric cancers are now diagnosed at stage I, many treated by endoscopic submucosal dissection rather than gastrectomy. No randomised trial exists; the evidence is observational, and the strategy is cost-effective only where incidence is high. In low-incidence countries the equivalent strategy is Helicobacter pylori test-and-treat, which prevents rather than detects cancer. China is expanding endoscopic screening in high-risk regions.","status":"standard-of-care","asOf":"2026-09-10","links":[{"label":"Korean endoscopic screening and gastric cancer mortality (Gastroenterology 2017)","url":"https://doi.org/10.1053/j.gastro.2017.01.029"}],"tags":[],"related":[],"cancers":["gastric","esophageal"],"sections":["early-detection"],"technologies":["endoscopic-resection"],"targets":[],"drugs":[],"companies":[],"institutions":[],"pathways":[],"terms":["screening","stage-shift","endoscopic-resection-term"],"trials":[],"people":[],"bottlenecks":[],"keyPapers":["paper-jun-gastroenterology"],"journals":[],"dependsOn":[],"notes":[],"principle":"Population-wide upper gastrointestinal endoscopy at a fixed interval with biopsy of suspicious lesions, exploiting the slow progression from atrophic gastritis and intestinal metaplasia to cancer.","strengths":["Large stage shift and organ-preserving treatment","Also detects oesophageal cancer and precursor lesions"],"limitations":["Endoscopist capacity and quality","Observational evidence only","Not cost-effective at Western incidence rates"],"since":1999},"route":"/technologies/gastric-endoscopic-screening/","neighbours":{"cancer":[{"id":"gastric","kind":"cancer","name":"Gastric & gastro-oesophageal junction cancer","route":"/cancers/gastric/"},{"id":"esophageal","kind":"cancer","name":"Oesophageal cancer","route":"/cancers/esophageal/"}],"section":[{"id":"early-detection","kind":"section","name":"Early Detection & Screening","route":"/fronts/early-detection/"}],"technology":[{"id":"capsule-endoscopy-systems","kind":"technology","name":"Capsule endoscopy (PillCam, EndoCapsule, CapsoCam)","route":"/technologies/capsule-endoscopy-systems/"},{"id":"endoscopic-resection","kind":"technology","name":"Endoscopic resection (EMR / ESD)","route":"/technologies/endoscopic-resection/"}],"term":[{"id":"endoscopic-resection-term","kind":"term","name":"EMR and ESD (endoscopic mucosal resection, endoscopic submucosal dissection)","route":"/terms/endoscopic-resection-term/"},{"id":"screening","kind":"term","name":"Screening","route":"/terms/screening/"},{"id":"stage-shift","kind":"term","name":"Stage shift","route":"/terms/stage-shift/"}],"paper":[{"id":"paper-jun-gastroenterology","kind":"paper","name":"Effectiveness of the Korean National Cancer Screening Program in Reducing Gastric Cancer Mortality","route":"/key-papers/paper-jun-gastroenterology/"}],"company":[{"id":"olympus","kind":"company","name":"Olympus","route":"/companies/olympus/"}]}}