The negative association between inflammatory bowel disease and Helicobacter pylori seropositivity

The role of Helicobacter pylori (H. pylori) in inflammatory bowel disease is a controversial argument. The initial theory of this study was that Helicobacter is a risk factor for inflammatory bowel disease. In this study, we investigated the coincidence of H. pylori exposure and IBDs.

This case-control study has been done in Babol, teaching Hospitals; 60 newly diagnosed IBD cases without any Helicobacter eradicating treatment and 120 control patients without inflammatory bowel disease evidence in biopsy, investigated for H. pylori exposure by IgA and IgG ELISA tests. Clinical information, demographics and ELISA test results have been analyzed using SPSS.Version.18 (level of significance was less than 0.05).

Mean age of case group was 42.27±13.64 years; in control group it was 45.52±13.83 years. There was a significant difference between the case and control groups in IgG study of the following subgroups: age under 30, females, males, urban, higher education level and BMI between 18.5 and 24.9 (p-value was respectively; 0.004, 0.014, 0.047, 0.002, 0.013, 0.003). On the basis of logistic regression; IBD was less common in females, patients with lower education and patients with positive result of IgG (p-value was respectively 0.002, 0.013, 0.010).

As a result of this study, Helicobacter pylori exposure, may could play a protective role against inflammatory bowel disease.