Treatment and prevention of NSAID induced gastroduodenal mucosal damage.

The use of aspirin and other nonsteroidal antiinflammatory drugs (NSAID) is associated with various degrees of gastroduodenal damage. The agents currently available for the treatment of NSAID induced gastric mucosal damage are histamine2-receptor antagonists, antacids, sucralfate and prostaglandin (PG) analogs. Although all of these agents are effective in healing gastric and duodenal injury if NSAID therapy is discontinued, currently available data suggest that there may be significant differences among these drugs in healing or preventing mucosal injury when NSAID therapy is continued. In particular, the synthetic PG misoprostol appears to be therapeutically superior to agents in the other drug classes in these settings.