Antral Gastrin Activity in Duodenal and Gastric Ulcers

Abstract

Summary Gastrin has been extracted from the antral mucosa of patients operated upon; 10 for duodenal ulcer, 11 for gastric ulcer, 2 for pyloric ulcer, and 1 for gastric carcinoma. The secretory activity of the gastrin preparations has been determined on unanesthetized gastric fistula cats. A satisfactory reproducibility of the extraction procedure and of the assay technique has been demonstrated. Gastrin activity per gram of antral mucosa amounted in the duodenal ulcer patients to more than 3 times the antral gastrin activity of the gastric ulcer patients, and the difference was highly significant. In the 2 patients with pyloric ulcer, antral gastrin activity corresponded to the average antral activity of the duodenal ulcer patients, and in the 1 patient with gastric carcinoma activity was less than the average antral activity of the gastric ulcer patients. The antral gastrin activity of 4 nonulcer human autopsy specimens varied greatly and gave no reliable information concerning the gastrin activity in antra from normal stomachs. The role of antral gastrin in ulcer genesis cannot be elucidated until the antral gastrin activity of normal stomachs has been established. The difference in gastrin activity between antra from duodenal and gastric ulcer patients suggests different genesis for these ulcers.