Fifty resected gastric adenocarcinomas were studied retrospectively to evaluate survival factors. Eleven different criteria were assessed using multivariate analysis. Only two criteria were significant: 1--cellular expression of carcinoembryonic antigen (p less than 0.0001 - CCR = 1.48) 2--intravascular or lymphatic tumor emboli (p less than 0.006 - CCR = 2.06). Thus, it is suggested that in addition to the various prognostic factors available to the surgical pathologist, the presence of cellular expression of carcinoembryonic antigen in tumor tissue will aid in predicting the prognosis of patients with gastric carcinoma.