Association between Helicobacter pylori colonization and infection with anemia and diabetes

This study aimed to compare the incidence of anemia and diabetes between Helicobacter pylori (H. pylori) seropositive patients with those who were seronegative. H. pylori is an important pathogen that causes gastrointestinal disorders. In addition to gastrointestinal complications, H. pylori infection also could cause extra-digestive diseases including idiopathic thrombocytopenic purpura. This retrospective cross-sectional study was conducted on collected data from patients who had anti-H. pylori serological tests with no history of H. pylori peptic ulcer disease and treatment for anemia and diabetes. We evaluated the laboratory data of 140 patients with anti-H. pylori serological tests that 74 patients of them (53%) were categorized as seropositive and 66 (47%) were included in the seronegative group. We detected no significant difference between the two groups in the incidence of anemia, neither for male (x²(1, N=65)=0.380, p=0.538) nor females (x²(1, N=75)=0.326, p=0.568). Ferritin levels also showed no significant difference between the 2 groups in both males (p=0.754) and females (p=0.133). In the evaluation of the incidence of diabetes in seropositive patients, we also observed no significant differences compared to seronegative subjects (x²(1, N=140) =0.557, p=0.456). Our findings indicated that H. pylori was not a main reason for anemia, in the population without significant upper gastrointestinal source of blood loss, or peptic ulcer disease, nor diabetes