Main Bacteriologic Features of Helicobacter pylori

Abstract

H. pylori is an S-shaped microaerophilic, gram-negative bacterium which colonizes the epithelial stomach surface of half the world’s population. The colonisation of H. pylori in human stomachs results in chronic gastritis and sometimes ulcers or gastric cancer. Infection mostly occurs during childhood and unless treated lasts for life. Treatment of H. pylori is relatively complicated and requires antibiotics to which the bacterium is sensitive. Thus a microbiological culture determining antibiotic resistance is a prerequisite for rational antibiotic treatment. Unfortunately, routine clinical practice is often done without such a culture, and hence, the treatment is frequently empirical, not based on antibiotic resistance data. In this chapter we will elaborate on how to isolate and culture this fastidious bacterium.

Keywords: Helicobacter pylori, morphology, genome, ulcers, chronic gastritis, plasmids, gene regulation, strain diversity.

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