Jf. Vera et al., SUCROSE PERMEABILITY IN CHILDREN WITH GASTRIC DAMAGE AND HELICOBACTER-PYLORI INFECTION, Journal of pediatric gastroenterology and nutrition, 24(5), 1997, pp. 506-511
Background: Increased permeability to sucrose has been recently shown
to be a good marker of gastric mucosal damage in adults. Methods: This
test was evaluated in 40 children consulting for recurrent abdominal
pain and the results were correlated with endoscopic and histologic fi
ndings and with the presence of H. pylori. Results: The gastric mucosa
was considered endoscopically normal in 31 children; 3 had duodenitis
, and 6 had mild gastritis. Abnormal endoscopic findings were associat
ed with increased urinary sucrose excretion (MANOVA F = 7.30; p = 0.00
2). In the 6 children with mild gastritis, mean sucrose excretion was
twice that of controls (0.060 +/- 0.024 vs. 0.029 +/- 0.018, respectiv
ely; p = 0.019) and significantly higher than the group with duodeniti
s (0.037 +/- 0.013;p = 0.038). The specificity and sensitivity of sucr
ose permeability test for detection of gastric damage were 90.3% and 8
3.3%, respectively. N. pylori was detected in 62.5% of children includ
ing all patients with mild gastritis, in 2 out of 3 with duodenitis an
d 17 out of 31 endoscopically normal controls. No differences in sucro
se excretion were observed in relation with the presence of II. pylori
or histological findings in the control group. Conclusions: Urinary s
ucrose excretion is a good marker of mucosal gastric damage in childre
n and may be used as a screening test in large groups of populations.