An insight into post-gastrectomy "alkaline reflux gastritis"

Area of Science:

• Gastroenterology
• Surgical Pathology

Background:

• Partial gastrectomy can lead to complications like entero-gastric reflux and gastritis.
• The pathogenesis of gastritis syndrome post-gastrectomy remains incompletely understood.

Purpose of the Study:

• To assess the prevalence of symptoms, entero-gastric reflux, endoscopic changes, and histological gastritis in partially-gastrectomized patients.
• To explore the relationship between reflux and gastritis syndrome in this patient group.

Main Methods:

• Studied 110 partially-gastrectomized patients.
• Assessed symptoms, fasting bile reflux, scintigraphic reflux, endoscopic findings, and histological gastritis.
• Analyzed correlations between histological findings, gastric environment, and reflux severity.

Main Results:

• High prevalence of reflux (86.9% fasting bile, 72.9% scintigraphic) and chronic gastritis (88.3%).
• Symptoms (37.2%) and endoscopic hyperaemia (72.7%) were less prevalent than reflux.
• No significant correlation found between the severity of reflux and symptoms, endoscopic changes, or gastritis.

Conclusions:

• Post-gastrectomy findings like symptoms and gastritis severity are not directly related to the degree of enterogastric reflux.
• The term "alkaline reflux gastritis syndrome" should be used cautiously due to the lack of clear correlation observed in this study.