Helicobacter pylori infection

The Helicobacter pylori infection is one of the most common bacterial infections in humans. Nearly 50% of the world´s population is infected. The incidence of H. pylori is correlated with the development of gastritis, peptic ulcer, gastric cancer and MALT lymphoma. The infection is usually acquired in childhood and is compatible with the socio-demographic factors such as low socioeconomic status, poor hygiene and other effects associated. In children, the diagnosis is often difficult. Symptoms such as abdominal pain, diarrhea, vomiting are nonspecific. Children often develop a serological response immunization against low-molecular-weight antigens.
Currently there are several invasive and non-invasive diagnostic tests for the detection of H. pylori infection at children. The invasive investigation methods are based mainly on the identification of H. pylori in culture, histological examination and urease rapid tests (RUT). Non-invasive tests include the detection of bacterial urease using the urea breath test (UBT), antibody-based detection in various media and other methods.
Antibody-based tests have been developed during the recent decades. These tests differ in their functions. The main advantages of antibody-based tests are their simplicity, low cost, speed and minimal burden on patients. Any proposed tests using antibody-based detection include enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) and Western blot (WB) technique. The ELISA has the advantage that many serum samples can be tested in parallel and the process can be fully automated.

Tags: antibodies, heliobacter, infection, pylori

This entry was posted on Friday, September 25th, 2009 at 5:09 am and is filed under Diagnosis. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.