Gastric cancer is the fifth most common cancer worldwide, though rates vary widely by region. Treatment typically combines surgery, chemotherapy, and sometimes radiation or targeted drugs. Many people are diagnosed at advanced stages, and five-year survival remains around 30% in the U.S., driving research into earlier detection and more effective therapies.
What's actually going on in research
Trials are testing checkpoint inhibitors like pembrolizumab and nivolumab, often combined with chemotherapy, for advanced disease. HER2-targeted drugs like trastuzumab deruxtecan are being studied in HER2-positive tumors. Researchers are also exploring combinations with VEGF inhibitors, FGFR inhibitors for specific mutations, and new approaches to perioperative treatment that sandwiches surgery between chemotherapy rounds.
Checkpoint inhibitor combinations
Pembrolizumab is FDA-approved for some advanced gastric cancers, and trials are testing it earlier in treatment and in new combinations. The focus is on finding which patients benefit most and which drug pairings work best.
HER2-targeted therapy
About 15% of gastric cancers overexpress HER2. Trastuzumab deruxtecan showed strong results in trials and is now being tested in earlier disease stages and compared against other HER2 drugs.
Perioperative strategies
Trials are testing whether giving chemotherapy before and after surgery improves survival compared to surgery alone or chemotherapy after surgery. Some studies add checkpoint inhibitors to these regimens.
What to know before you search
Eligibility often depends on disease stage, prior chemotherapy, HER2 status, microsatellite instability testing, and performance status.
What types of trials are currently open
- Treatment trials — Testing new drug combinations, often checkpoint inhibitors or targeted drugs paired with chemotherapy, for advanced gastric cancer.
- Perioperative trials — Studies of chemotherapy or immunotherapy given before and after surgery to improve cure rates in earlier-stage disease.
- Targeted therapy trials — Testing drugs aimed at specific mutations or proteins, such as HER2, FGFR2, or Claudin18.2.
- Biomarker studies — Identifying genetic or molecular features that predict which treatments will work for which patients.
- Screening trials — Testing methods for detecting gastric cancer earlier, particularly in high-risk populations.
Recently added Gastric Cancer trials
Retrospective Analysis of Early Gastric Cancer Patients Based on Prospective Clinical Dataset
The goal of this retrospective observational cohort study is to describe the real-world clinicopathological characteristics, evolving treatment patterns, and long-term oncological outcomes of early gastric cancer (EGC) patients in China, utilizing a large prospective clinical database. The main questions it aims to answer are: How do different treatment modalities, including endoscopic resection, laparoscopic surgery, open surgery, and combined laparoscopic-endoscopic approaches, influence the long-term survival (Overall Survival and Disease-Free Survival) and recurrence patterns in Chinese EGC patients? What are the key clinicopathological factors affecting prognosis in this population? This study will retrospectively enroll approximately 5000 patients with histopathologically confirmed gastric adenocarcinoma staged as early gastric cancer (per AJCC 8th edition) from the information database of the National Clinical Research Center for Digestive Diseases. Researchers will systematically collect baseline demographics, treatment details, surgical complications, pathological staging, and longitudinal follow-up data (up to 10 years post-surgery) for all eligible patients. By comparing the short-term safety profiles and long-term survival benefits across different treatment groups and identifying risk factors for recurrence, this study aims to provide high-quality, China-specific evidence to guide standardized and individualized clinical decision-making for early gastric cancer.
Methylation Profile Test (Methylscape) in Body Fluids for Multi-Cancer Detection and Monitoring in Colombia
DNA methylation changes occur early and broadly during carcinogenesis. Methylscape is a rapid assay that detects global DNA methylation patterns in body fluids (blood, urine, and saliva) and may detect a cancer signal and predict the cancer signal origin (CSO) from a single fluid sample, using the differential interaction between methylated and unmethylated DNA and gold nanoparticles. This prospective observational study evaluates the diagnostic performance (sensitivity and specificity) of the Methylscape test in Colombian patients with various biopsy-confirmed solid tumors compared with age- and sex-matched cancer-free (healthy) volunteers. The study is conducted in three parts: Phase 1 validates the assay in 250 patients with cancer; Sub-study 2a compares 1,500 patients with cancer against 1,500 matched cancer-free volunteers; and Sub-study 2b uses serial blood and urine sampling in 300 patients with early-stage disease to assess detection of disease relapse during follow-up, in parallel with standard imaging. The study also estimates positive and negative predictive values (PPV/NPV) and projects the budget impact and cost-effectiveness of Methylscape as a multi-cancer early detection (MCED) tool in an upper-middle-income Latin American setting.
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