BATON ROUGE — Rates of stomach cancer among younger people are on the rise, which is why experts are encouraging everyone to learn the signs and symptoms.

"It used to be a cancer of old age, you know, 70s and 80s. But now I'm seeing 20-, 30-, 40-year-old people with cancer," Dr. Travis Grotz, a Mayo Clinic surgical oncologist, said.

Dr. Grotz says many younger patients with stomach cancer are being diagnosed late — when treatment is less effective.

"And I think, unfortunately, the younger patients, they often think they had a bad meal. They think — even physicians, you know, think — that it's just reflux; they're just stressed out; they're too young to have cancer," Dr. Grotz said.

Symptoms of gastric cancer can include weight loss, reflux, indigestion, difficulty swallowing and anemia, but may be dismissed as minor issues in younger people.

"You know, reflux and having heartburn, indigestion, gastritis, that can be normal, absolutely. But you certainly want to be aware of that and evaluate and make sure there's not something more sinister going on," he said.

As for what's causing the increase in stomach cancer among young people, Dr. Grotz says it could be a new, unknown risk factor, possibly related to food preparation or environmental factors.