Collagenous gastritis: Epidemiology and clinical associations

Abstract

Backgroundthe rare occurrence of collagenous gastritis (CG) makes its epidemiology difficult to investigate. We designed a study to determine the demographic and clinical characteristics as well as the associations of CG with other upper gastrointestinal diseases in a large national clinicopathological database. Methodsfrom the IDEA database we extracted all patients with histopathologically documented CG and, in a case-control study, we compared 168 subjects with and 1,286,165 subjects without CG using odds ratios (OR) with their 95% confidence intervals (CI). Resultsthe prevalence of CG was 13 per 100,000 EGDs. CG was significantly more common among female than male patients (OR: 1.69, 95% CI: 1.20–2.39) and was characterized by a bi-modal age distribution (first peak in patients aged 10–19, second peak primarily in females aged >60 years). CG patients presented with diarrhea (18%), anemia (12%), weight loss (11%), and vomiting (10%). CG was significantly associated with other lymphocytic disorders of the upper gastrointestinal tract, including celiac sprue (2.12, 1.55–2.88), duodenal intraepithelial lymphocytosis (3.71, 2.30–5.98), and lymphocytic gastritis (23.2, 10.9–49.5). CG persisted in 69% of patients who underwent multiple consecutive endoscopies. Conclusionsthe epidemiologic features of collagenous gastritis reflect on different etiologies contributing to its occurrence in children and adults.