Intragastric pH pattern analysis in patients with duodenogastric reflux.

The intention of the present study was to apply 24-hour intragastric pH monitoring as a diagnostic tool for the detection of pathologic duodenogastric reflux. Therefore, an evaluation system was developed which is able to recognize and quantify specific intraluminal gastric pH patterns regarding their specificity for the disease. pH parameters, stored during 24 h and processed, according to the evaluation system, were obtained for a healthy control population (n = 30) and for patients with pathologic duodenogastric reflux (n = 11). These data were subjected to computerized discriminant analysis to identify pH changes with a high probability of resulting from pathologic duodenogastric reflux. The computer analysis identified 16 discriminating pH parameters to separate a physiologic pH pattern from a 24-hour intragastric pH pattern with a high probability of being associated with pathologic duodenogastric reflux.