Clinical Impact of Nutrition and Inflammation Assessment Tools in Gastric Cancer Treatment

Abstract

The standard treatment for gastric cancer is surgical resection and perioperative adjuvant treatment. Multidisciplinary treatment for gastric cancer leads to nutritional and inflammatory changes. Nutritional and inflammatory changes during multidisciplinary treatment can lead to poor physical activity, severe toxicity in patients receiving chemotherapy or radiation therapy, and poor oncological outcomes. Evaluation of the perioperative nutritional and inflammatory status during treatment is necessary in order to utilize and optimize multidisciplinary therapy for gastric cancer. If physicians were able to detect the perioperative nutritional and inflammatory status before and during gastric cancer treatment, they would be able to select the optimal treatment and perioperative nutritional treatment. Recently, various types of nutrition and inflammation assessment tools were developed and reported for gastric cancer. These nutrition and inflammation assessment tools have some clinical advantages, such as ease of implementation, perioperative accessibility, and low cost. On the other hand, each tool has its own clinical characteristics, which must be understood before using it in the clinical practice. This review summarizes the background, current status, and future perspectives on the application of nutrition and inflammation assessment tools in gastric cancer treatment.