Detection of Helicobacter pylori in paraffin-embedded specimens from patients with chronic liver diseases, using the amplification method.

Helicobacter DNA has been detected in the liver specimens of patients with various hepato-biliary diseases. The aim of this study was to investigate the presence of H. pylori DNA in the liver tissue of Iranian patients with chronic liver diseases (CLD). Genomic DNA was extracted from the paraffin sections of 46 liver biopsies of patients with CLD and 13 from patients with metastatic adenocarcinoma as a control group. Polymerase chain reaction (PCR) analysis was carried out using primers for H. pylori 16S rRNA and cagA genes. On analysis, 17 of the 46 patient samples were positive in H. pylori 16S rRNA PCR and 2 of the 13 were positive from the control group. None of the samples were positive for the cagA gene. This study showed the greater presence of H. pylori-like DNA in the liver samples from patients with CLD than in controls.