Campylobacter pyloridis in peptic ulcer disease: microbiology, pathology, and scanning electron microscopy

After the recent successful isolation of spiral organisms from the stomach this paper presents the bacteriological and pathological correlation of gastric antral biopsies from 51 patients endoscopied for upper gastrointestinal symptoms. Campylobacter pyloridis was cultured from 29 patients and seen by either silver staining of the biopsy or scanning electron microscopy in an additional three. The organism was cultured from 23 of the 33 (69%) patients with peptic ulcer disease and from within this group 17 (80%) of the 21 patients with duodenal ulceration. It was cultured only once from the 12 normal biopsies in the series but from 27 of the 38 (71%) biopsies showing gastritis. C pyloridis was also cultured from five out of seven of the 14 endoscopically normal patients, who despite this had biopsy evidence of gastritis. It was the sole organism cultured from 65% of the positive biopsies and scanning electron microscopy invariably revealed it deep to the surface mucus layer. C pyloridis persisted in the three patients with duodenal ulcers after treatment and healing. The findings support the hypothesis that C pyloridis is aetiologically related to gastritis and peptic ulceration though its precise role still remains to be defined.