Recent studies have reported an association between
acid-suppressing
drugs (histamine H2 receptor antagonists and
proton pump inhibitors) and development of infectious
gastroenteritis. We conducted a case-control study nested in a cohort of more than 170,000 ever-users of
acid-suppressing drugs to examine the association between
acid-suppressing drugs and bacterial
gastroenteritis, using data from the General Practice Research Database in the United Kingdom. We identified 374 confirmed cases of bacterial
gastroenteritis and 2,000 randomly sampled controls from the study cohort. There was little increased risk of bacterial
gastroenteritis among users of
acid-suppressing drugs [relative risk (RR) = 1.1; 95% confidence interval (CI) = 0.8-1.4].
Omeprazole "single users" had an RR of 1.6 (95% CI = 1.0-2.4), but this effect was not observed among those using only
omeprazole during the last year (RR = 1.1; 95% CI = 0.7-1.9). We did not find any dose or
treatment duration response. These data do not support a major role for
acid reduction in the development of bacterial
gastroenteritis.