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Apoptosis in Helicobacter pylori Gastritis is Related to cag A Status
Author(s) -
Cabral Mônica M.D.A.,
Mendes Cláudia M.C.,
Castro Lúcia P.F.,
Cartelle Christiane T.,
Guerra Juliana,
Queiroz Dulciene M.M.,
Nogueira Ana M.M.F.
Publication year - 2006
Publication title -
helicobacter
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.206
H-Index - 79
eISSN - 1523-5378
pISSN - 1083-4389
DOI - 10.1111/j.1523-5378.2006.00440.x
Subject(s) - helicobacter pylori , curvatures of the stomach , gastritis , antrum , apoptosis , immunohistochemistry , gastric mucosa , gastroenterology , atrophy , foveolar cell , medicine , biology , stomach , pathology , chronic gastritis , biochemistry
Background: Helicobacter pylori infection increases gastric epithelial cell apoptosis; however, the influence of cag A status is still controversial. We aimed to investigate if cag A status is related to apoptosis in H. pylori gastritis at different anatomic sites of the gastric mucosa. Materials and Methods: We studied by immunohistochemistry (streptavidin–biotin method) pro‐apoptotic (Bax and Bak) and antiapoptotic (Bcl‐2 and Bcl‐x) proteins expression, scored from 0 to 4, in gastric biopsies, at the antrum (lesser and greater curvatures), incisura, and corpus (greater curvature) from 50 patients with H. pylori gastritis (22 males, 28 females, median age 40 years) and eight non‐infected patients (6 males, median age 39.6 years). H. pylori and cag A status were determined by polymerase chain reaction. Results: Apoptotic proteins were expressed in a granular pattern, in the cytoplasm of foveolar cells; Bax and Bak expression was higher than Bcl‐2 and Bcl‐x in most cases and was significantly higher in patients infected by cag A‐positive strains than in those infected by cag A‐negative strains ( p = .001). Bak expression was higher at the lesser curvature (antrum and incisura) than in the other regions ( p = .002) and was correlated with atrophy. Anti‐apoptotic proteins were significantly more expressed at the antral lesser curvature than in the other regions of the stomach (Bcl‐2: p = .02; Bcl‐x: p < .001). Conclusions: Infection with cag A‐positive strains is significantly associated with overexpression of pro‐apoptotic proteins in the gastric mucosa, mainly at the antral lesser curvature, which may have a role on atrophy development. Anti‐apoptotic proteins were also overexpressed at the lesser curvature, which may occur to keep epithelial cell turnover or might be related to malignant transformation.