Diagnosis of Gastritis – Review from Early Pathological Evaluation to Present Day Management

The ancient Egyptians wrote that the diseases of internal organs are difficult to detect even in well-preserved bodies, hence they were not able to comprehend outstanding discoveries on the stomach as they did on other organ diseases. The first major discovery in the field of gastric diseases was the description of gastric cancer by the Persian Avicenna around 1000 (quoted by Rugge et al, 2003). At the same time the discoveries of non-neoplastic gastric dis‐ eases, especially gastritis, was really elusive for quite a long time due to less macroscopic features and to post-mortem alternations. The inflammation of the inner lining of the stom‐ ach was first noted as “gastritis” by a German physician, Georg Ernst Stahl in 1728 (quoted by Bock, 1974). Italian anatomical pathologist Giovanni Battista Morgagni further described the signs of gastric inflammation. He gave the first classical description of an erosive or ul‐ cerating gastritis. He stated that some of the erosions can become gangrenous, and descri‐ bed corrosive gastritis as it was the most well-known gastritis form of that time due high number of lye intoxication. French physician, François-Joseph-Victor Broussais gathering in‐ formation by autopsy of dead French soldiers between 1808 and 1831, described common chronic gastritis as he called “Gastritides”, and sometimes got delusive conclusions as gas‐ tritis was the cause of ascites and other diseases, like typhoid fever and meningitis (Bock, 1974). Jones Handfield and Wilson Fox (1854) described microscopic changes of mucous membrane in gastric inflammation, which exists in diffuse and segmental forms. Not much