In Japanese patients with type A gastritis with pernicious anemia the condition is very poorly associated with Helicobacter pylori infection.

There are conflicting views about the association between type A gastritis with pernicious anemia (PA) and infection with Helicobacter pylori, and currently, no definite conclusion has been reached. In this study, we evaluated H. pylori infection in patients with type A gastritis who developed PA. The study included a total of 25 Japanese patients (13 males and 12 females) who had been diagnosed with PA at our department, with a mean age of 71.2 years. We diagnosed infection with H. pylori by measuring serum H. pylori-IgG antibodies in all 25 patients, and we performed gastric biopsy in 17 patients. They were all negative for H. pylori-IgG antibody (0/25) and H. pylori on gastric biopsy (0/17). Although the prevalence of H. pylori infection (70-80 %) in our age-matched controls in Japan is higher than the prevalence in similar populations in western countries, we believe that type A gastritis with PA is very poorly associated with H. pylori infection.