ABSTRACT
Helicobacter pylori is well established as the causative agent of gastric and duodenal ulcer gastritis gastric cancer and iron deficiency anemia. The detection of Helicobacter pylori infection can be performed easily by the rapid urease test (RUT) which has high sensitivity and specificity. However most commercial kits available in the market \ are expensive. To reduce the cost, HRH Princess Maha Chakri Sirindhorn Medical Center has produced the RUT kit for using in our own clinical laboratory. The purpose of this study was to evaluate sensitivity and specificity of home-made RUT compared with histopathologic examination. Cross sectional study of patients who underwent esophagogastroduodenoscopy and gastric biopsy was performed during June 2008 to May 2009. One-hundred and ninety-seven patients were included in the study. The sensitivity, specificity, positive and negative predictive values and accuracy of home-made RUT were 91.8%, 100%, 100%, 96.5% and 97.5%, respectively. Furthermore, 62% of the test showed positive results within 1 hour. In brief, our home-made RUT has good sensitivity and specificity for detection of Helicobacter pylori infection.