Prevalence of Helicobacter pylori vacA , cagA , dupA and oipA Genotypes in Patients with Gastric Disease

Gastric diseases such as chronic gastritis and gastric cancer are most commonly caused by virulence factors of Helicobacter pylori (H. pylori), such as the vacA, cagA, dupA and oipA genes. Therefore, this study investigated the prevalence and the combination of these virulence factors from patients with gastric diseases. The endoscopic biopsies were obtained from 516 patients with gastric symptoms, 101 of which were from patients with normal gastric tissue, 365 of which were from patients with chronic gastritis, and 50 of which were from patients with gastric cancer. H. pylori and the virulence factors were detected by PCR. The oipA gene exhibited an increased risk for chronic gastritis (p = 0.0296), and the vacA gene demonstrated a risk for gastric cancer from chronic gastritis (p = 0.0002). Based on the combination of the virulence factors, cagA, vacA, dupA and oipA genes exhibited a high prevalence in patients with chronic gastritis and gastric cancer. The cagA+/dupA+ genotype demonstrated a significant correlation in patients with normal gastric mucosa (p = 0.0278). In the chronic gastritis group, a significant association was observed between the cagA+ and the vacA s1m1 genotypes (p cagA+/dupA+ genotypes (p = 0.0183), the dupA+/oipA+ genotypes (p cagA, vacA, dupA, and oipA genes, which contributed to the risk of developing gastroduodenal diseases. Furthermore, this is the first study to reveal a high prevalence of the oipA gene in H. pylori isolates in Brazil.