Abdominal and dyspeptic symptoms in patients with peptic ulcer treated medically or surgically.

Abstract

BACKGROUND:

Abdominal and dyspeptic complaints, which are prominent symptoms in patients with peptic ulceration, are commonly reported in the general population. There are few reports of follow-up study of peptic ulcer therapies in which clinical outcome has been compared with symptom reporting in community controls.

METHODS:

Three populations of patients with peptic ulcer disease (patients who had elective proximal gastric vagotomy (PGV), those having PGV for emergency indications and those receiving medical treatment with H2-receptor antagonists) were included in a questionnaire survey and compared with a group of randomly selected community controls.

RESULTS:

The vagotomized patients reported fewer abdominal complaints (P = 0.0003) and fewer dyspeptic complaints lasting for more than 1 week (P = 0.05) than those treated medically. There was no significant difference between vagotomized patients and community controls in the reporting of abdominal (P = 0.2) or dyspeptic (P = 0.9) complaints.

CONCLUSION:

Taking abdominal complaints as the endpoint for former peptic ulcer treatment, surgical treatment with PGV seemed to be superior to therapy with H2-receptor antagonists and produced an almost identical level of complaints to that seen in the community population.

• Authors: R O Lindsetmo, R Johnsen, A Revhaug
• Journal: The British journal of surgery (Br J Surg) Vol. 85 Issue 6 Pg. 845-9 (Jun 1998) ISSN: 0007-1323 [Print] England
• PMID: 9667721 (Publication Type: Clinical Trial, Journal Article, Randomized Controlled Trial, Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't)

Chemical References

• Histamine H2 Antagonists

Topics

• Adult
• Aged
• Aged, 80 and over
• Dyspepsia (etiology)
• Emergencies
• Female
• Histamine H2 Antagonists (therapeutic use)
• Humans
• Male
• Middle Aged
• Peptic Ulcer (complications, drug therapy, surgery)
• Peptic Ulcer Hemorrhage (etiology, surgery)
• Peptic Ulcer Perforation (etiology, surgery)
• Prospective Studies
• Vagotomy (adverse effects, methods)