Vacuolating cytotoxic activity of 40 Helicobacter pylori strains isolated from Turkish patients.

In this study we examined the in vitro vacuolating cytotoxic activity of Helicobacter pylori, which is a gram-negative microaerophilic curved bacterium and a causative agent of gastritis, peptic ulcer and gastric ulcer. A vacuolating cytotoxin assay was performed to assess the vacuolating activity of 40 strains (20 gastritis, 11 gastric ulcer, and 9 duodenal ulcer), which were obtained from patients undergoing upper gastrointestinal endoscopy. The Vero cell line was used in the cytotoxic assay. Of the 40 isolates, 24 (12 gastritis, 6 gastric ulcer, 6 duodenal ulcer) were cytotoxic for the Vero cell line at 1:4 and 1:8 dilutions. Thus, vacuolating cytotoxin of H. pylori affects the Vero cell line, but it seems there is no correlation between the positivity of the strains and the risk of any particular H. pylori disease.