ENDOSCOPIC VERSUS HISTOPATHOLOGICAL DIAGNOSIS OF PAN-GASTRITIS IN PATIENTS WITH CHRONIC GASTRIC DYSPEPSIA

Background: Dyspepsia is a clinical syndrome including manifestations related to the upper gastrointestinal tract. Options for evaluating dyspeptic patients include therapeutic trials, testing for Helicobacter pylori, upper gastrointestinal (UGI) radiography, and endoscopy. Objective: To compare the endoscopic and histopathologic diagnosis of gastritis in patients presented with chronic gastric dyspepsia to evaluate the relative frequency and pattern of different types of gastritis in patients presented with chronic gastric dyspepsia. Patient and method: Prospective cross-sectional study on 120 patients with chronic dyspepsia more than 8 weeks. All patients underwent gastroscopy. The findings of gastric inspection were recorded for all patients. Biopsy specimens were taken. Two from the anterior and posterior antrum, two from the anterior and posterior body, and two from any additional area of abnormality. Diagnostic criteria were applied to histological features and each histopathological parameter (chronic inflammation, activity, atrophy, intestinal metaplasia and H. pylori density) were graded for assessment of their severity as 0= absent, 1= mild, 2=moderate or 3= severe in the corpus and antrum. Results: Endoscope revealed normal gastric mucosa in 33 patients (27.5%), gastritis in 64 patients (53.3%) and other lesions in 23 patients (19.2%). As regard gastritis, there was edema in 61 patients (95.3%), erythema in 45 patients (70.3%), atrophy in 10 patients (15.6%) and mucosal nodularity in 10 patients (15.6%). As regard location of gastritis, it was pan-gastritis in 44 patients (68.8%), Antrum predominant gastritis in 10 patients (15.6%) & corpus predominant gastritis in 10 patients (15.6%).As regard other lesions, there was Duodenal ulcer in 7 patients (30.4%), peptic ulcer in 3 patients (13%), esophagitis in 2 patients (8.7%), erosive gastritis in 4 patients (17.4%), upper GIT suspecting malignancy in 2 patients (8.7%) and hiatal hernia in 5 patients (21.7%). Histopathology results were Normal in 18 (18.6%), Chronic inflammation in 79 (81.4%), Neutrophilic infiltration in 60 (61.7%), Glandular atrophy in 10 (10.3%), Intestinal metaplasia in 3 (3.1%) and H. pylori density in 47 (48.5%). Gastritis was detected by Endoscopy in 64 (53.3%) and in 79 (81.4%) by histopathology. This difference was statistically significant (p-value: 0.014). Conclusion: The prevalence of gastritis among the dyspeptic patients is very high since we observed endoscopically gastritis in 64 patients (53.3%) and other lesions in 23 patients (19.2%). The concordance between endoscopic findings and histopathological diagnosis of gastritis was (81%). High prevalence of H.Pylori among the dyspeptic patients (48.5%). Gastritis was better detected by histopathology.