nomenon indicative of the presence of a risky microenvironment, might be of some use in practice if there should be a regular association of this type of metaplasia with gastric cancer, a finding that is not always, or indeed very seldom, observed [3]. Thus, the natural history of intestinal metaplasia in the gastric mucosa continues to be doubtful in terms of its specificity in relation to gastric carcinogenesis, even when reliable methods are used for the detection of sulfated mucins. From this viewpoint, intestinal metaplasia is considered by some not to be as strongly indicative of gastric cancer as is marked atrophy of the gastric mucosa itself [4].In this issue of Gastric Cancer, Shimada and coworkers [5] again discuss this matter, emphasizing a possible immunohistochemical marker indicative of a high risk of development of gastric cancer, mainly applicable to patients submitted to treatment for an early carcinoma of the stomach. This study is a retrospective evaluation of the presence of brain (fetal)-type glycogen phosphorylase (BGP) in gastric mucosa with metaplasia, associated with different types of early gastric cancer. However, this is not their first report on the immunohistochemical detection of BGP in the metaplastic and neoplastic gastric epithelium. The same group of investigators has been studying the histopathology and the characteristics of immunoreactivity of anti-BGP antibodies in different situations. The first result of these studies dates back to 1984, when the group described the conspicuous expression of BGP in proliferative cells of intestinal metaplasia of the stomach and of well-differentiated gastric carcinoma [6]. At the time, the authors concluded that BGP expression and well-differentiated gastric adenocarcinoma may represent a more significant association than that occurring between intestinal metaplasia and gastric carcinoma. In summary, from a histological viewpoint, BGP expression by the gastric epithelium may provide a safer indication of carcinogenic potential of certain areas of the gastric epithelium.Offprint requests to: A.J.A. Barbosa