Clinical Pharmacology and Therapy of Helicobacter pylori Infection

There are few areas in medical science where the information explosion exceeds the capacity for a busy clinician to keep up to date. One such area is Helicobacter pylori. Since the first paper identifying H. pylori was published in 1983, great progress has occurred concerning H. pylori and its causal relationship to gastritis, duodenal ulcer, gastric ulcer and gastric cancer. In a field which is moving so fast, a lot of new information is continuously reported at medical meetings, often published only in abstract form, without further appearing in peer-reviewed journals. Even gastroenterologists, unless actively involved in the field of H. pylori research themselves, find it difficult to keep abreast of the field. Although several volumes and monographs have appeared on H. pylori, this book is the only one entirely devoted to the clinical pharmacology and therapy of the Helicobacter infection. It is clear that the real-world indications for H. pylori treatment are being broadened, and it is impossible to turn back the tide of prescribing by primary care physicians or gastroenterologists. Some effective and safe eradication regimens are available today but several new ones, often simple variations of an old scheme, are being proposed as equally effective and safe. This volume, which covers the treatment of all the H. pylori-related digestive diseases as well as the management of treatment failure and reinfection, will be a valuable reference text for all those physicians who pursue the cure of this common human infection.