Initial Assessment, Risk Stratification, and Early Management of Acute Nonvariceal Upper Gastrointestinal Hemorrhage

Comparison of urgent and early endoscopy for acute non-variceal upper gastrointestinal bleeding in high-risk patients

OBJECTIVE

Data regarding early (within 24h) and urgent endoscopy (within 12h) in non-variceal upper gastrointestinal bleeding (NV-UGIB) revealed conflicting results. This study aimed to investigate the impact of endoscopy timing on the outcomes of high-risk patients with NV-UGIB.

PATIENTS AND METHODS

From February 2020 to February 2021, consecutive high-risk (Glasgow-Blatchford score ≥12) adults admitted to the emergency department with NV-UGIB were analyzed retrospectively. The primary composite outcome was 30-day mortality from any cause, inpatient rebleeding, need for endoscopic re-intervention, need for surgery or angiographic embolization.

RESULTS

240 patients were enrolled: 152 (63%) patients underwent urgent endoscopy (<12h) and 88 (37%) patients underwent early endoscopy (12-24h). One or more components of the composite outcome were observed in 53 (22.1%) patients: 30 (12.5%) had 30-day mortality, rebleeding occurred in 27 (11.3%), 7 (2.9%) underwent endoscopic re-intervention, and 5 (2.1%) required surgery or angiographic embolization. The composite outcome was similar between the groups. Multivariate analysis showed only hemodynamic instability on admission (OR: 3.05, p=0.006), and the previous history of cancer (OR: 2.42, p=0.029) were significant in predicting composite outcome. In terms of secondary outcomes, the endoscopic intervention was higher in the urgent endoscopy group (p=0.006), whereas the number of transfused erythrocyte suspensions and the length of hospital stay was higher in the early endoscopy group (p=0.002 and p=0.040, respectively).

CONCLUSIONS

Urgent endoscopy leads to a significant reduction in the length of hospitalization and the number of transfused erythrocyte suspensions in NV-UGIB, which can contribute to patient satisfaction, reduce healthcare expenditure, and improve hospital bed availability. The composite outcome and its sub-outcomes were the same among both groups.

Biopsy in emergency gastroscopy does not increase the risk of rebleeding in patients with Forrest I acute nonvariceal upper gastrointestinal bleeding combined with suspected malignant gastric ulcer: a multicenter retrospective cohort study

BACKGROUND

Few studies have reported whether a biopsy in emergency gastroscopy (EG) increased the risk of rebleeding in patients with Forrest I acute nonvariceal upper gastrointestinal bleeding (ANVUGIB) combined with suspected malignant gastric ulcer (SMGU). This study aims to conduct a multicenter retrospective cohort study using propensity score matching to verify whether a biopsy in EG increases the risk of rebleeding in patients diagnosed with Forrest I ANVUGIB combined with SMGU.

METHODS

Using the data for propensity-matched patients, logistic regression models were fitted using rebleeding as the dependent variable. Survival time was defined as the length of time the patient experienced from visiting the emergency department to rebleeding. We used the Kaplan-Meier (KM) method to analyze the 30-day survival of the patients with and without a biopsy after matching, and the log-rank test was performed to examine the differences in survival.

RESULTS

With the use of propensity score matching, 308 patients who underwent a biopsy in EG were matched with 308 patients who did not. In the five logistic regression models, there were no significant group differences in the risk of rebleeding in patients with Forrest I ANVUGIB combined with SMGU between the biopsy and no-biopsy groups. The probability of survival was not significantly different between the no-biopsy and biopsy groups.

CONCLUSIONS

In this multicenter, retrospective propensity score matching cohort study, compared with patients without a biopsy, patients with a biopsy during EG had no increased risk of rebleeding, and there was no significant difference in the rate of rebleeding.

The Clinical Impact of Rockall and Glasgow-Blatchford Scores in Nonvariceal Upper Gastrointestinal Bleeding

Introduction

Risk stratification in patients with nonvariceal upper gastrointestinal bleeding (NVUGIB) is crucial for proper management. Rockall score (RS; pre-endoscopic and complete) and Glasgow-Blatchford score (GBS) are some of the most used scoring systems. This study aims to analyze these scores' ability to predict various clinical outcomes and possible cutoff points to identify low- and high-risk patients. Secondarily, this study intents to evaluate the appropriateness of patients' transfers to our facility, which provides a specialized emergency endoscopy service.

Methods

This study was retrospectively conducted at Centro Hospitalar Universitário do Porto and included patients admitted to the Emergency Department with acute manifestations of NVUGIB between January 2016 and December 2018. Receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curves and corresponding areas under the curve (AUC) were calculated. Transferred patients from other institutions and nontransferred (directly admitted to this institution) patients were also compared.

Results

Of a total of 420 patients, 23 (5.9%) died, 34 (8.4%) rebled, 217 (51.7%) received blood transfusion, 153 (36.3%) received endoscopic therapy, 22 (5.7%) had surgery, and 171 (42.3%) required hospitalization in the Intermediate or Intensive Care Unit. Regarding mortality prediction, both complete RS (AUC 0.756, p < 0.001) and pre-endoscopic RS (AUC 0.711, p = 0.001) showed good performance. In the prediction of rebleeding, only complete RS (AUC 0.735, p < 0.001) had discriminative ability. GBS had good performance in the prediction of transfusion (AUC 0.785, p < 0.001). No score showed discriminative capability in the prediction of other outcomes. Transferred and nontransferred patients had similar pre-endoscopic RS (3.41 vs. 3.34, p = 0.692) and GBS (13.29 vs. 12.29, p = 0.056). Only patients with GBS ≥6 were transferred to our facility. There were no adverse outcomes recorded in any group when GBS was ≤3.

Discussion/Conclusion

Complete RS and pre-endoscopic RS are effective at predicting mortality, but only complete RS showed good performance at predicting rebleeding. GBS is better at predicting transfusion requirement. Our study suggests that a transfer can possibly be reconsidered if GBS is ≤3, although current recommendations only propose outpatient care when GBS is 0 or 1. Patients' transfers were appropriate, considering the high GBS scores and the outcomes of these patients.

Differences in emergency endoscopy outcomes according to gastrointestinal bleeding location

BACKGROUND AND AIM

With recent technological advances in the field of endoscopic hemostasis, the prognosis of patients with gastrointestinal (GI) bleeding has improved. However, few studies have reported on the clinical course of patients with GI bleeding. This study aimed to evaluate the differences in clinical outcomes of patients with lower GI bleeding (LGIB) compared with upper GI bleeding (UGIB) and the factors related to their prognosis.

METHODS

Patients who had undergone emergency endoscopy for GI bleeding were retrospectively reviewed. The severity of GI bleeding was evaluated using the Glasgow-Blatchford (GB), AIMS65, and NOBLADS scores. Patients in whom obvious GI bleeding relapsed and/or iron deficiency anemia persisted after emergency endoscopy were considered to exhibit rebleeding.

RESULTS

We reviewed 1697 consecutive patients and divided them into UGIB (1054 patients) and LGIB (643 patients) groups. The proportion of patients with rebleeding was significantly greater in the UGIB group than in the LGIB group; the mortality rate was significantly higher in the UGIB group than in the LGIB group. Multivariate analysis showed that a GB score ≥12 and an AIMS65 score ≥2 were significantly associated with rebleeding in the UGIB group, whereas a NOBLADS score ≥4 was significantly associated with rebleeding in the LGIB group. Notably, the influence of emergency endoscopy differed according to GI bleeding location.

CONCLUSIONS

The clinical course was significantly worse in patients with UGIB than in patients with LGIB. The influence of emergency endoscopy differed according to GI bleeding location.

The utilization of CTA in management of gastrointestinal bleeding in a tertiary care center ED. Are we using it enough?

BACKGROUND

Gastrointestinal (GI) bleeding is a common patient presentation to the Emergency Department (ED) and the source can be difficult to diagnose.

PROCEDURE

Computed tomography angiography (CTA) is a new but validated modality with high sensitivity and specificity for diagnosis and treatment of GI bleeds, especially in differentiating arterial from venous bleeding. With high reported validity of CTA, some studies have suggested its ability to better triage patients in the ED and impact ED workflow and resource utilization. We evaluated the use of CTA use an academic tertiary care center ED for GI bleeding.

FINDINGS

Retrospective chart review of 1493 patient (2012-2015), one - way ANOVA, and one-tail t-test, found CTA is used significantly less (0.7%) compared to classical endoscopy (75.7%, p < .001), video capsule endoscopy (VCE)(4.8%, p < .001), tagged red blood cell scintigraphy(4.4%, p < .001), and traditional catheter-directed angiography(2.88%, p < .001). In our subset of 11 CTA cases, we found mean time (in hours) to CTA was faster than mean time to endoscopy, 31:47 [95% CI: -7:50-71:24] and 42:44 [95% CI: 18:27-67:01] respectively. The difference in means between time to CTA and time to endoscopy did not achieve statistical significance, 12:57 h [95% CI -18:51-44:45; p = .40].

CONCLUSION

We concluded that in light of its validation against these other diagnostic modalities, CTA may be underutilized in the care of patients with GI bleeding and should be studied further to study its impact on early risk stratification, treatment, and resource utilization.

Assessment of endoscopic Doppler to guide hemostasis in high risk peptic ulcer bleeding

INTRODUCTION

Rebleeding or emergency surgery in failed endoscopic therapy of peptic ulcer bleeding are associated with high rates of morbidity and mortality. The clinical benefit of an endoscopic Doppler (ED) examination prior to endoscopic injection therapy was evaluated in high risk ulcer patients for rebleeding episode. Standard injection therapy (non-Doppler (ND)) was compared with targeted injection therapy after examination of the supplying vessel in the ulcer base by the ED.

MATERIALS AND METHODS

Sixty patients with peptic ulcer bleeding (Forrest Ia-IIa; Rockall score of 5 or higher) were included in the study. Patients were assigned to ED or ND group with conventional therapy by chance. In the ND group injection was directed by the visual aspect of the ulcer, whereas in ED therapy was directed by ED.

RESULTS

Thirty-five patients were allocated to the ED group, and 25 to the ND group, respectively. No significant differences in patient or ulcer characteristics were observed regarding ulcer size, localization, Forrest classification or endoscopic treatment. Recurrent bleeding was observed in 7/35 (20%) in the ED group and in 13/25 (52%) of patients in the ND group (p = .013). Fewer ED patients needed surgery for rebleeding (1/35 vs. 6/25; p = .017). Bleeding related, but not all-cause mortality was significantly lower in the ED group (1/35 vs. 6/25, p = .017).

DISCUSSION

In this comparative analysis, use of ED to guide hemostatic therapy was associated with a significant reduction in recurrence of bleeding, surgical intervention and bleeding associated mortality.

Role of endoscopy in acute gastrointestinal bleeding in real clinical practice: An evidence-based review

Although upper gastrointestinal bleeding is usually segregated from lower gastrointestinal bleeding, and guidelines for gastrointestinal bleeding are divided into two separate sections, they may not be distinguished from each other in clinical practice. Most patients are first observed with signs of bleeding such as hematemesis, melena, and hematochezia. When a patient with these symptoms presents to the emergency room, endoscopic diagnosis and treatment are considered together with appropriate initial resuscitation. Especially, in cases of variceal bleeding, it is important for the prognosis that the endoscopy is performed immediately after the patient stabilizes. In cases of suspected lower gastrointestinal bleeding, full colonoscopy after bowel preparation is effective in distinguishing the cause of the bleeding and treating with hemostasis. The therapeutic aspect of endoscopy, using the mechanical method alone or injection with a certain modality rather than injection alone, can increase the success rate of bleeding control. Therefore, it is important to consider the origin of bleeding and how to approach it. In this article, we aim to review the role of endoscopy in diagnosis, treatment, and prognosis in patients with acute gastrointestinal bleeding in a real clinical setting.