Acute gastrointestinal bleeding: A comparison between variceal and nonvariceal gastrointestinal bleeding

Abstract

Acute upper gastrointestinal bleeding (UGIB) is a typical medical emergency, with an incidence of 84 to 160 cases per 100,000 individuals and a mortality rate of approximately 10%. This study aimed to identify all cases of UGIB hospitalized in a tertiary gastroenterology department, to identify possible predictive factors involved in rebleeding and mortality, potential associations between different elements and the severity of bleeding, and the differences between the upper digestive hemorrhage due to nonvariceal and variceal bleeding. This was an observational, retrospective study of patients with UGIB admitted to the tertiary Department of Gastroenterology between January 2013 and December 2020. A total of 1499 patients were enrolled in the study. One thousand four hundred and ninety-nine patients were hospitalized for 7 years with active upper digestive hemorrhage, 504 variceal bleeding, and 995 nonvariceal bleeding. When comparing variceal with nonvariceal bleeding, in nonvariceal bleeding, the mean age was higher, similar sex, higher mortality rate, higher rebleeding rate, and higher hemorrhagic shock rate. Endoscopy treatment was also performed more frequently in variceal bleeding than in nonvariceal bleeding. Severe anemia was found more frequently in patients with variceal bleeding. The mortality rate was 10% in the entire study group, which was not significantly different between the 2 batches. However, the rebleeding rate is higher in patients with variceal gastrointestinal bleeding.

Figure 1.

Study flowchart.