On March 19-21, 2014, No Stomach For Cancer founder Karen Chelcun Schreiber attended the 2nd Consensus meeting on Hereditary Gastric Cancer at Radboud University Medical Center in Nijmegen, the Netherlands. The 47 workshop attendees represent stomach cancer researchers and medical professionals, including gastroenterologists, surgeons, geneticists, counselors, dietitians, and pathologists, from all over the world, including the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Australia, Germany, Denmark, Italy, Canada, Portugal, Switzerland, France, and the USA. Five members of NSFC’s own Scientific Advisory Council participated (Fatima Carneiro, Raquel Seruca, Parry Guilford, David Huntsman, and Pardeep Kaurah). NSFC board member Jennifer Lai also attended. The group’s goal while there was to make important updates and changes to the current consensus guidelines for HDGC.
Karen was invited to chair the newly added Patient and Dietician workshop group to present and discuss a patient viewpoint on how effective the current guidelines are and what outstanding issues still need to be addressed in research or clinical management. Other disciplines included gastroenterology, surgery, genetics/basic science, counseling and psychosocial aspects, and pathology. Keynote lecturers at the workshop were Parry Guilford (geneticist, NZ) and Carlos Caldas (geneticist, UK), who presented “Translation of basic science into clinical practice” and “How advances in genomics are impacting understanding and management of familial gastric cancer syndromes,” respectively.
NSFC is extremely proud to continue being a part of this important effort. Since then, general awareness of HDGC and the identification of many more affected families have grown significantly. Some of the questions brought forth by many members of NSFC over the years were addressed at this workshop. Among others, they include genetic testing criteria, DNA banking, lobular breast cancer risk, colon cancer risk, endoscopic screening and surveillance, prophylactic gastrectomy options, and long-term post-TG issues.