The.progress in diagnosis and surgical treatment of gastric cancer contributes to the raised diagnosis rate and 5-year survival rate of gastric cancer patients in Japan. According to the clinical data of 273 142 Japanese gastric cancer patients from 1962 to 1991, the proportion of patients with stage I gastric cancer was increased from 22.5% to 58.1%, and the accumulative 5-year survival rate from 37.5% to 68.8%. The improvement of the accumulative 5-year survival rate was remarkable for patients with stage Ⅱ gastric cancer (from 47.7% to 70.3%) and stage Ⅲ gastric cancer (from 26.4% to 45.0%).