[Importance of endoscopy with biopsy in gastroduodenal amyloidosis. Apropos of 5 cases].

The authors report five cases of gastric amyloidosis in addition of the fourty three published cases. These cases was polyvisceral forms, 4 times primitive and 1 time secondary to a psoriasic rheumatism. Three times only the patients had complaints of digestive tract. Four times non specific radiologic and endoscopic signs lead to a biopsy which permits diagnosis. The biopsy of gastric mucosa must take place beside the rectal biopsy; more difficult to do, it might be more successfull because the stomach is more often infiltrated by amyloidosis than the colon.