Helicobacter Pylori: Symptoms, Transmission Routes and Prevention

From the data published by the World Health Organization in 2008, there are already 500 million people worldwide suffering from stomach diseases. And lifestyle changes and poor eating habits are leading to more and more young people suffering from gastric diseases and stomach cancer. WHO data show that the incidence of gastric cancer in young people under 35 years old is twice as much as 30 years ago.

Helicobacter Pylori

In addition to staying up late, drinking alcohol and eating spicy food, H. pylori infection has also become the culprit behind the high incidence of gastric disease. In the list of carcinogens published by the International Agency for Research on Cancer of the World Health Organization, H. pylori is listed in the list of the first group of carcinogens.

According to statistics, about 50% of the world’s population is infected with H. pylori, so guess if you’ve been hit?

Helicobacter pylori is a spiral, microanaerobic bacterium. It was first successfully isolated from gastric mucosal biopsy tissue of patients with chronic active gastritis in 1983 and is the only microbial species known to be able to survive in the human stomach. H. pylori disease includes gastritis, peptic ulcers, and lymphoproliferative gastric lymphoma caused by H. pylori infection.

Clinical Manifestations of Helicobacter Pylori

Once infected with H. pylori, the patient will experience fullness, discomfort or pain in the upper abdomen after eating, often accompanied by other adverse symptoms such as belching, bloating, acid reflux and loss of appetite. Some patients may also experience recurrent episodes of severe abdominal pain and small amounts of bleeding from the upper gastrointestinal tract.

Another very typical symptom is bad breath! The reason why H. pylori is able to escape from stomach acid is related to a gas it releases, which feeds on stomach-related tissues and metabolizes ammonia gas, which wraps around it , forming an ammonia cloud that isolates the direct contact between stomach acid and the bacteria, causing stomach acid to be unable to kill it.

Ammonia gas is a very pungent gas, so the patient has a distinctive characteristic of bad breath, which is difficult to get rid of by brushing the teeth.

If you have the above symptoms, it is recommended to go to the hospital for a breath test, and if you are indeed infected with H. pylori, you should treat it reasonably under the guidance of your doctor. There are the following two points we need to pay attention to.

1. Infection with H. pylori will not heal itself.
2. However, H. pylori disease can be cured.

The risk of developing cancer does not increase if medication and life interventions are performed early. Along with the treatment, you should do the following measures.

1. Undergo H. pylori eradication treatment.
2. Eat more fresh fruits and vegetables, reduce the intake of pickled and smoked and high-salt foods.
3. Control your weight
4. Do not smoke

The human body is not immune to H. pylori, there is the possibility of being infected twice or even multiple times, so we should have regular medical checkups and not be careless.

H. pylori Transmission Channels

Prevention is better than cure, through a reasonable way to cut off the transmission chain of H. pylori is the best way to prevent and control the disease, the specific transmission of H. pylori can be identified in two main ways.

1. Oral-oral transmission: such as parents kissing their children’s mouths, do not implement the meal system, toothbrushes, and cups mixed.
2. Fecal-oral transmission: unclean lifestyle, such as not washing hands after the toilet, etc.

Prevention of Helicobacter Pylori

To prevent stomach diseases, it is recommended to do the following 3 things.

1. Regular screening for gastric cancer, especially for people with a family history of gastric disease and those older than 40 years old, should follow medical advice to screen for H. pylori.
2. Once H. pylori infection is detected, seek medical treatment as soon as possible and under the guidance of professional doctors.
3. Maintain oral hygiene and personal hygiene, and recommend meal sharing and the use of communal chopsticks during meals.