Diagnosis of Helicobacter pylori infection in adults and children by using the Malakit Helicobacter pylori, a commercially available enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay

Malakit Helicobacter pylori (Biolab, Limal, Belgium) is a second-generation enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) for the detection of Helicobacter pylori infection. We evaluated its ability to diagnose H. pylori infection in 489 asymptomatic pregnant women, 427 asymptomatic children, and 95 symptomatic children. 87 asymptomatic adults (17.8%), 31 asymptomatic children (7.3%), and 27 symptomatic children (28.4%) were seropositive. We observed an increase in H. pylori infection with age. 13C-urea breath tests were performed for all seropositive and 100 randomly selected seronegative asymptomatic adults. They were also performed for all seropositive and 65 randomly chosen seronegative asymptomatic children. Breath tests were positive for 86 of 87 (98.9%) seropositive adults, 30 of 31 seropositive children (96.8%), and no seronegative individual. Compared with those of culture, the sensitivity and specificity of the Malakit Helicobacter pylori were both 96%. We conclude that the Malakit Helicobacter pylori is equally suitable for adults and children. Therefore, this ELISA can be proposed as an important alternative to other more time-consuming and/or more expensive diagnostic tests for the detection of H. pylori.