RESUMO
Three gastric mucosal biopsies were obtained from 300 patients showing a normal upper digestive tract endoscopy. Histologically in 9 percent of the patients the biopsies were normal; in 87 percent showed a common-type chronic gastritis and in 4 percent showed a reactive (chemical or reflux-type) gastritis. Helicobacter pylori was present in 25.9 percent of the patients without gastritis, in 33.3 percent of the patients with reactive gastritis and in 87.7 percent of those with common-type gastritis. In 19.9 percent of the patients with common-type chronic gastritis there was intestinal metaplasia, consisting of type I metaplasia in 14.1 percent, type II in 3.1 percent and type III metaplasia in 2.3 percent. The association of type III intestinal metaplasia with the other forms of metaplasia, its lower frequency and its tendency to be present in older patients supports the hipothesis that type III incomplete colonic metaplasia represents a more advanced stage than complete and incomplete small bowel metaplasia of the gastric mucosa