Abstract
Chronic gastritis is one of the most frequently encountered disease, which is supposed to be caused by a number of elements.
Since the developement of anti-tuberculous chemotherapy, gastro-intestinal disorders have commonly occured in patients on long term anti-tuberculous chemotherapy. However the relation between chemotherapy and gastro-intestinal disorder is not well understood.
With the aids of recently advanced gastroscopy, gastric disease, especially chronic gastritis has been precisely diagnosed.
We analyzed gastric complaints of patients received long term anti-tuberculous chemotherapy and performed gastrofiberscopic examination of these patients to study the relationship between chemotherapy and gastric disorders.
The results are summarized as follows:
1. Approximately 70% of 159 patients on chemotherapy had gastric complaints and nearly half of them developed symptomes after they began to use chemotherapoietics.
2. The most commonly encountered gastric symptomes were anorexia, fullness of stomach and heartburn.
3. The most common gastric disease found by the gastrofiberscope were atrophic gastritis.
4. Atrophic gastritis was found more frequently in aged patients and in patients on long term anti-tuberculous chemotherapy, compared with superficial gastritis.
5. Some patients with gastric complaints showed no pathological findings in gastric mucosa on gastrofiberscopic examination.
As Shioda et al pointed out, gastric complaints of patients on chemotherapy are not necessarily caused by a direct impairement of gastric mucosa. The fact that some of the patients with gastric complaints showed no pathological findings in gastric mucosa in our study confirmed the report of Shioda et al.
The types and frequency of chronic gastritis of patients on chemotherapy showed similar tendencies with those of non-tuberculosis patients.
Anti-tuberculous chemotherapy may become the cause of gastric complaints and of chronic gastritis of patients using these drugs, however, it is presumed that no particular disease process may be brought about by these chemopoietic agents.
