OBJECTIVE This study was designed to examine the long-term survival of a homogenous group of patients with stage IE or IIE-1 gastric lymphoma after complete surgical resection. BACKGROUND The management of gastric lymphoma remains controversial. Enthusiasm for multimodality approaches for gastric lymphoma has lead to the current trend of using chemotherapy as primary treatment, thus avoiding gastric resection. Surgery, however, may result in improved long-term survival rates. METHODS The records of all patients with the diagnosis of gastric lymphoma from 1980 to 1991 were reviewed retrospectively. Of 106 patients examined, 34 underwent curative resection and regional lymphadenectomy for pathologically staged IE or IIE-1 (pN1) gastric lymphoma. Fifteen patients underwent surgery alone, whereas 19 also received postoperative adjuvant therapy. RESULTS The median follow-up time was 74 months. The 10-year actuarial disease-free survival was 91% for stage IE disease (n = 23) and 82% for stage IIE-1 disease (n = 11). There were no operative deaths and a 26% morbidity rate. No difference in survival was found for those treated with adjuvant therapy. CONCLUSIONS The results compare favorably to those reported with the use of primary chemotherapy and radiation therapy and suggest that surgery remains the best frontline therapy for early gastric lymphoma.