UPPER GASTROINTESTINAL BLEEDING: A PROSPECTIVE EPIDEMIOLOGICAL STUDY OF 72 CASES

Aims Upper gastrointestinal bleeding (UGIB) is a common medical condition that results in substantial morbidity and mortality.

The objective of this work is to study the epidemiological profile of UGIB in our department.

Methods A prospective descriptive study including patients admitted for UGIB from January to December 2020. All patients underwent upper endoscopy. We collected epidemiological, etiologies and endoscopic data.

Results The study included 72 patients with UGIB, 31 males (43.1%) and 41 females (56.9%), sex ratio (F/M)=1.2. The age distribution and patient's medical history were:

Table 1

Age distribution	The mean age was 56.5+−6.8	<40 years: 19.4%	40–60 years: 23.6%	>60 years : 56.9%
Patient’s medical history	Portal hypertension : 13.7%	Antiplatelet therapy : 13.7%	Anticoagulants therapy : 11%	Known gastrointestinal ulcer: 4%

17 patients (23.28%) presented with hematemesis, 25 patients (34.24%) presented hematemesis and melena, 29 patients (39.72%) presented melena and 8 patients (10.95%) presented rectal bleeding.

The average time to perform gastroscopy was 36.97 h+− 8.9. The main diagnoses were bleeding on esophageal varices in 13 patients (17%), gastrointestinal ulcer in 23 patients (31.5%), gastric tumor process in 4 patients (5%), gastric angiodysplasias and peptic esophagitis in 5 patients each (6.8%) and normal gastroscopy in 12 patients (16%). Endoscopic hemostasis was performed by variceal ligation in 11 patients (15%), APC (6%), application of clips (3%), biological glue injection and hemostatic spray (1%).

Fig. 1

Conclusions The majority of UGIB occurred in patients over 60 years of age in our series. Upper endoscopy is the key examination and is the main step for diagnostic and therapeutic purposes. The most common etiologies are ulcer disease and portal hypertension-related bleeding. Specific management varies according to the causative lesion and prognosis has been improved by rapid and effective management.

Publication History

Article published online:
14 April 2022