Endoscopic diagnosis of gastritis. Pros and cons.

The endoscopic characteristics of inflammation in the stomach, in contrast to those of the esophagus and colon, are inconspicuous or lacking. "Endoscopic gastritis" does not correlate sufficiently with "histologic gastritis" and the term "gastritis" is to be limited to cases confirmed histologically. Terminology of gastric mucosa changes should be based on macroscopic features and should use descriptive terms proposed by the OMED nomenclature.