Methodological problems and pitfalls of urea breath test

Although several papers on the urea breath test have been published, some m ethodological questions are still unsolved: the dose of C-13-urea, the test meal composition, the breath sampling, the fasting or fed condition, the p ostural settings, and the cut-off points. Moreover, special conditions, suc h as those occurring in paediatric and uraemic patients or subjects with pr evious gastric surgery should be borne in mind when evaluating the C-13-ure a breath test results. This review focusses on methodological problems and potential pitfalls which can affect the accuracy of the C-13-urea breath te st.