Drug induced acute erosive gastritis. Its prevention by antacid, metiamide and cimetidine

The usefulness of antiinflammatory and analgesic drugs such as aspirin, indomethacin, phenylbutazone etc. is often limited by gastrointestinal side effects, especially gastric bleeding. Newer antiinflammatory drugs such as naproxen, ketoprofen, ibuprofen and tolectin have been introduced. These agents were suggested to be less injurious to the gastric mucosa but massive gastric bleeding was seen after their use in the rat and in man. Other drugs such as colchicine, D-penicillamine, L-Dopa and capasaicin are also suspected of causing gastric injury. Some of these drugs, like bile salts, can disrupt the gastric mucosal barrier and thus allow back diffusion of H+. The presence of gastric acid probably is necessary for the occurrence of acute erosions. This study was designed to find out if various drugs given by esophageal intubation to rats would produce acute gastric erosions, which they did. The prevention of such erosions by the prior administration of antacids like mylanta II or metiamide and cimetidine (H₂ receptor antagonists which inhibit gastric acid production) was confirmed.