The prevalence of anti-Helicobacter (Campylobacter) pylori antibodies in patients and healthy blood donors.

An enzyme linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) with a sonicated suspension of Helicobacter (Campylobacter) pylori as antigen was used to detect anti-H. pylori antibodies in 517 patients without dyspepsia or peptic ulcer symptoms and 401 healthy blood donors. The criterion of seropositivity was determined from a receiver operating curve computed with the values of optical densities of 48 sera from dyspeptic patients with proven helicobacter-associated gastritis and 16 sera from dyspeptic patients with normal antral mucosa and no microbiological or histological evidence of H. pylori infection. The 227 (44%) seropositive persons amongst the patient group appeared to be significantly higher than the 142 (35%) sera with antibodies in the blood donors tested (p less than 0.03), even when adjustment was made for increasing age. We conclude that the prevalence of antibodies against H. pylori increases with age and that although antibodies are more prevalent in patients attending a hospital than in healthy blood donors, seropositivity suggestive of current or past infection can be found in one third of a randomly chosen population of blood donors.