[Serologic diagnosis of Helicobacter pylori in endoscopy personnel. Serology in endoscopists]

the Helicobacter pylori entered into the medical world, particularly in the field of the Gastroenterology, revolutionizing it, and changing partially our physiopathological concepts and treatment of the gastroduodenal ulcer. This infestation results in an immune response, that is measured by means of serologic tests, which are very useful in the massive screening studies, mainly in population at risk like those who are institutionalized and the personnel of health, particularly workers of the departments of Gastroenterology.

motivated for this, we carry out a prospective study in 38 endoscopists using as controls 38 workers not related with a Gastroenterology department. Thus, we analyzed the presence of antibodies against Helicobacter pylori among the personnel of the departments of Gastroenterology of three hospitals of Havana City. These personnel filled a form designed for this purpose containing following data: age, sex, time of work as endoscopist, use of protection means, and history of gastroduodenal pathology.

there were 24 women in each group (63,2%). Whereas the seroprevalence among endoscopists was 39,47%, in the control group, only three people were seropositives (7,89%). We found a positive correlation between the time working as endoscopists and the rate of seropositivity.

our study demonstrated that endoscopists have a significantly higher risk than the controls of contracting the infection by the Helicobacter pylori, and that the seropositive endoscopists have sintomatology more frequently than the seronegative endoscopists, although these differences were not statistically significant.