Helicobacter Forums

Hello there, im an 18 year-old male, kind of athletic, i had h pylori twice back in 2017 and 2018.
On May 24th i started to feel the symptoms such as nausea, belly pain, loss of appetite, not wanting to eat at all (although i used to eat okay and a lot of junk food), dizzy, anxiety and thought it was h pylori as well.
I went to the lab and made a stool test which came back negative and i went to my doctor, he asked me couple of questions and prescribed omiz plus for 28 days (twice a day).
I had final exams and i was studying and not thinking much about eating beside the appetite loss and i used to eat one sandwich all day for like weeks and my weight got down about 4-5 kgs, and i have to mention that im skinny and a hard weight gainer.
after finishing the omiz i felt a very slight improvement but had almost the same symptoms, i finished my exams and i went to the doctor again and he told me to redo the h pylori stool test and it came back positive and that was July 18th.
I started to take the triple therapy which was:
Muxava 400gm once a day
Flagyl 500Gm twice a day
And another medicine i used to take half an hour before eating (sorry i dont remember the name)
anyway, i finished the treatment August 2nd, and thought i needed time to get back to normal.
Now 10 days later most of symptoms have gone and feeling improvement but still not feeling 100%, the most symptoms im feeling now are appetite loss, weight loss due to not eating very well (sometimes 1 meal a day), and dizziness when i stand up and sometimes nauseous in the morning which goes after a while and a bit of sore throat which i believe due to drinking cold water which was always bad choice for me (i dont know if this is related). and i will do the check test for h pyolri after a couple of days.
My questions are:
1. Is it okay that it has been 2 months and a half and im still feeling some of the symptoms?
2. does anxiety actually make them worse ?
3. When the test first came negative then positive i was really worried and dont know what to believe, was it a false positive or a false negative?
4. Is it okay to have appetite loss for this much? it is improving slightly but still feeling it
5. do these symptoms show that the h pyolri is not fully eradicated ?
6. what might it be if not h pylori?
7. does it take time to feel better especially if i didnt treat it good at first?

Please help me out, i really cant stop thinking about what it might be and so worried about my health condition, my anxiety is driving me crazy
Thank you in advance.

regardless if you had H. pylori before, it is important to find out if you still carry H. pylori, especially after antibiotic treatment.
So, a follow up test is important. A breath test is probably better than stool test in your case. However, if breath test is not available, then you'll have to rely on stool test. Try to get a number from the stool test. not just a positive or negative. The strength of the positive or negative would give you a hint on how accurate the test is.

Yes, it is common that the symptoms may persist even after H. pylori eradication. However, the symptoms are weaker and will gradually get better.

Yes, anxiety will make it worse. Anxiety can trigger all gastric symptoms like H. pylori.

Usually after H. pylori eradication, the appetite will return and patient will gain weight. However, anxiety also plays an important role in appetite.

There are people having the symptoms but without H. pylori. These patients can only control the symptoms by taking PPI or H2 blocker.

If you did not eradicate H. pylori, your symptoms will likely to get worse. So it is best to have it eradicated.

Hi could you pls help i as you know was treated 1 1/2 yrs ago and took endoscope showing intestinal metaplasia i suffered alot and still have issues now i took my kids for routine blood tests my daughter is negative but my son is showing positive stating lga 41 uml 41-50 u/ml >50 u/ml positive i actually tested him last yr via stool test which was negative so please what would you do in this situation help needed pls

blood test positive doesnt always means it's infected.
blood test positive means the person has previously been infected or exposed to H. pylori.
Stool/breath test is the test that shows if the person is currently infected with H. pylori.

So, it's good to know that your son got a negative stool test.

Hi we took stool test 1 1/2 yrs ago via stool. Negative so how can blood be positive i dont understand he must have bin infected in the last yr 1/2 i think dont know

So i have just done a stool sample and results weakly positive does this mean i am infected recently?

A weak positive just meant weak accuracy. A repeat is recommended. Alternatively, you can try other testing methods, eg. breath test.

as for the blood test, here is the explanation.
once you are infected with a pathogen, your immune system will recognise and develop memory to the infection. So the next time the same pathogen infect you again, your body can quickly fight it off.
So, once you are expose to H. pylori, regardless if H. pylori successful or not successfully colonise in you, your body will generate antibody against it. The antibody can remain in your body for a months or years. Some articles reported that antibody against H. pylori can still be detected after 5 years. Hence, a positive blood test only meant you had been exposed to H. pylori before and cannot be used as a diagnostic test to show current infection. especially after treatment.

Hi just quick update went back to the same lab that gave me weak positive result on stool testing. They tested my stool again and it came back negative now i need to concentrate on my 7 yr old son who tested positive by blood test this bacteria is really taking over are lives we were all negative a yr last april

yea... weak positive is equal to weak accuracy.
blood test positive only means he was exposed to H. pylori before. It doesnt mean that he is currently infected with H. pylori.

glad you brought this up in this forum.

Hi could you please explain about my 7 yr old son he has never taken anti biotics infact he tested negative 1 1/2 yrs ago and now positive via blood test can his body fight and he get rid of this himself he has no symptoms but honestly some drs say treat him because i have intestinal metaplasia and some say dont but i cant live the rest of my life worried about this bacteria and i dont want him to suffer like i did. Also is helibacter only contagious when the person has symptoms pls help