The impact of brushing teeth on carbon-14 urea breath test results.
OBJECTIVE
The 14C urea breath test noninvasively detects the presence of the urease-producing bacteria Helicobacter pylori in the stomach. Several sources of errors have been identified to cause false or indeterminate results on the test. The objective of this study was to identify whether brushing teeth affects the test results.


METHODS
We performed the 14C urea breath test on 168 patients, with breath samples counted at 10 and 20 min after oral administration of 2 microCi (74 kBq) 14C urea. Ninety-four patients brushed their teeth before the test while 74 did not.


RESULTS
Thirty-six of the 74 patients (49%) who did not brush their teeth had positive results at 10 min, which became negative at 20 min. None of the 94 patients who brushed their teeth before testing showed this pattern with agreement of results at 10 and 20 min.


CONCLUSIONS
We recommend brushing teeth before the 14C urea breath test since it significantly decreased the ambiguous results of the test in our laboratory.
Higazy
E
E
Department of Nuclear Medicine, Kuwait University, Safat.
Al-Saeedi
F
F
Loutfi
I
I
Heiba
S
S
Kalaoui
M
M
Al-Nakib
B
B
Patty
S
S
Mohammed
A
A
Gopinath
S
S
Mathew
M
M
Hussein
A
A
Samy
M
M
Elgazzar
A
A
D000284:Administration, Oral; D001419:Bacteria / Q000378:metabolism; D001944:Breath Tests; D002250:Carbon Radioisotopes / Q000008:administration & dosage; D016481:Helicobacter Infections / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging; D016480:Helicobacter pylori / Q000378:metabolism; D006801:Humans; D009055:Mouth / Q000382:microbiology; D011877:Radionuclide Imaging; D013997:Time Factors; D014099:Toothbrushing; D014508:Urea / Q000008:administration & dosage
D002250:Carbon Radioisotopes; D014508:Urea