Endoscopic diagnosis of intestinal metaplasia in Canada and Japan.

We carried out comparative studies on chronic atrophic gastritis with accompanying intestinal metaplasia using the methylene blue dye spraying, endoscopic technique on 167 Japanese and 77 Canadian outpatients free of gross stomach disease. In both population samples (Kyoto, Japan and St. John's, Newfoundland) with increasing subject age, the fundic-pyloric (F-P) border shifted cephalad indicating atrophy of the fundic mucosal glands. Japanese subjects, however, showed greater variation in location of the F-P border. The reduction in fundic gland area with aging was followed by intestinal metaplasia, the incidence and severity of which was greater in Japanese than in Canadian outpatients. From these data we conclude that a difference in the gastric mucosa in these two countries may be related to the pathogenesis of gastric cancer.