[Utility of urease rapid test for detection of Helicobacter pylori in patients with upper gastrointestinal bleeding from peptic ulcer].

BACKGROUND

Peptic ulcer disease is the main cause of upper gastrointestinal bleeding and Helicobacter pylori is its principal etiology. The sensitivity of the diagnostics tests is low for the detection of H. pylori en the setting of bleeding peptic ulcer. In addition there are different results among them.

OBJECTIVE

To validate the rapid urease test (RUT) in patients with bleeding peptic ulcer.

METHODS

We prospectively included patients older than 14 years old who presented with bleeding peptic ulcer and performed diagnostic studies of RUT and histology for the detection of H. pylori. Two biopsies were taken (one from the antrum and another one from the corpus) for RUT and four biopsies (two from both antrum and corpus) for histology. RESULTS Ninety-three patients were included, gastric ulcer was the most frequent site of the bleeding. 48 patients were positive for H. pylori by histology studies and 55 patients were positive to H. pylori by RUT. The sensitivity and specificity of the RUT were 89.6% (IC 77.3-96.5) y 73.3% (IC 58.0-85.4) respectively.

CONCLUSIONS

The RUT has a high sensitivity for the detection of H. pylori en the setting of bleeding peptic ulcer.