SIMULTANEOUS PROLONGED MEASUREMENT OF GAS TRODUODENAL MOTILITY AND DUODENOGASTRIC REFLUX

We combined a newly developed ambulatory fiberoptic system for detecti ng intragastric bilirubin (Bilitec 2000, Synectics Medical Inc., Swede n) with prolonged measurement of gastroduodenal motility in 10 healthy volunteers and 18 patients following BI resection. Circadian intragas tric bilirubin exposure and the total number of tremendous changes of bilirubin absorption (more than 20 %, over a period of at least 5 min) were significantly increased in the BI-resected patients (P < 0.05). In patients the interdigestive motility cycle (IMC) was characterized by the appearance of several types of abnormally propagated phase III activity fronts. Of the tremendous increases of bilirubin absorption i n the patient group, 90.1 % were associated with abnormally propagated phase III activity fronts. In cases of increased duodenogastric reflu x, the combination of ambulatory intragastric bilirubin measurement an d long-term manometry seems to be feasible to assess motility and refl ux simultaneously.