Academic CRO/Industrial collaborations in drug discovery (Track)




PREVALENCE OF HELICOBACTER PYLORI INFECTION IN CONNECTION WITH GASTRIC CANCER


Azza S. Abdelkafe, Md. Zeyaullah, Abdulrahman M. Kaabi, Abdulrahman A. Alfifi, Asmari Mufarreh and Arif Ali

Department of Food Technology, Faculty of Agriculture, Omar Al-Mukhtar University, Al-Baida, Libya.

Abstract:

Helicobacter pylori is found in the stomachs of about one-third of the adults in developed countries and in about two thirds of the adults in developing countries. A proportion of infected people develop peptic ulceration. There is, however, a great deal of uncertainty as to whether the infection can also predispose to gastric cancer (the second most common cause of cancer death worldwide). About one million patients are newly diagnosed with gastric cancer each year, with 700,000 deaths each year. Gastric cancer can be caused by the interaction between environmental factors and genetic variations. As an environmental factor, H. pylori infection plays an important role in the development of gastric cancer. However, only a small proportion of H. pylori carriers develop gastric cancers. Such clinical diversity indicates that there are likely to be other factors in gastric carcinogenesis, including genetic susceptibility of the host.

Most recent study confirmed that gastric cancer risk is increased in individuals with blood group A, as opposed to those in non-A blood groups. The individuals with blood group O showed a significant reduced risk of gastric cancer comparing with non-O blood groups. The susceptibility of blood group A individuals to gastric cancer may be partially attributed to an increased risk of H. pylori infection. The study implied that there must be a host genetic susceptibility for gastric cancer. However, the exact molecular mechanism underlying the relationship between ABO blood groups, H. pylori infection and gastric cancer needs to be further explored.