BACKGROUND: This study was designed to explore the relationships between serologic Helicobacter pylori positivity and demographic, behavioural, and symptomatologic factors in patients consulting for dyspeptic symptoms in general practice.METHODS: H. pylori enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay results and checklist data were collected by general practitioners at three community health centers in southern Sweden from consecutive patients aged 18-65 years with upper abdominal pain or discomfort (dyspepsia).RESULTS: Of the 130 available patients with dyspepsia, 127 agreed to participate, 45 (mean age, 41.2 years) being classified as H. pylori-positive and 82 (mean age, 33.5 years) as H. pylori-negative. Manual workers were diagnosed as H. pylori-positive significantly more often than were non-manual workers (p < 0.05). Of those patients examined earlier by gastroscopy or roentgenography, H. pylori-positives reported stomach or duodenal ulcer significantly more often than did H. pylori-negatives (p < 0.01). H. pylori-positives reported stomach/duodenal ulcer in their parents/siblings to a significantly greater extent than did H. pylori-negatives (45.2% versus 10.1%, p < 0.001). H. pylori-negatives reported stress-generated symptoms significantly more often than did H. pylori-positives (82.9% versus 61.5%, p < 0.01). Hierarchical regression analyses showed that, when age and sex were controlled for, the ability of each of these measures to predict the serologic results remained significant.CONCLUSIONS: Higher levels of H. pylori antibodies in dyspeptic patients appear to be associated with a relatively low self-perception of stress, with manual work, with being older, and with the occurrence, both in the patients themselves and in their close relatives, of stomach/duodenal ulcer.
Abdominal Pain Adolescent