Prevalence and Correlation with Clinical Diseases of Helicobacter pylori cagA and vacA Genotype among Gastric Patients from Northeast China

Helicobacter pylori vacA and cagA genes have significant genetic heterogenicity, resulting in different clinical outcomes. Northeast part of China has reported high prevalence of H. pylori infections and gastric cancer. Hence, we investigated the H. pylori cagA and vacA genotypes with clinical outcomes in Northeast China. Gastric tissue samples (n = 169), chronic gastritis (GIs), gastric ulcer (GU), and gastric cancer (GC) were analysed for 16S rRNA ureA, cagA, and cagA genotypes by PCR. A total of 141 (84%) cases were found positive for H. pylori by 16S rRNA and ureA. GC showed high H. pylori infection (93%) compared with GIs (72%) and GU (84%). The vacAs1am1 was highly found in GC (40%) and GU (36%), vacAs1am2 in GIs (33%), vacAs1bm1 (14%) and vacAs1bm2 (8%) in GU cases, and s2m1 in normal cases (33%), while vacAs1cm1 showed low frequency in GIs (2%) and GU (3%) and GC showed negative result. The East-Asian cagA strain was highly observed in GC (43%), as compared to GIs (41%) and GU (20%). The East-Asian cagA/vacAs1am1 was significantly higher in GC (23%) than in GU (22%) and GIs (145) patients. The East-Asian type cagA with vacAs1a and vacAm1 is the most predominant genotype in H. pylori strains of Northeast China.