The urea breath test is a H. pylori urea breath test that determines whether a patient is infected with H. pylori.
H. pylori produces the highly active enzyme urease. If a patient with H. pylori infection in the stomach takes carbon 14 or carbon 13 labeled urea, the urease enzyme in the stomach will break down the carbon 14 or carbon 13 labeled urea into carbon dioxide, and the patient’s breath will produce carbon 14 or carbon 13 labeled carbon dioxide.
Doctors usually collect the amount of carbon dioxide labeled with carbon 14 or carbon 13 in the H. pylori urea breath test to determine if the patient has H. pylori infection.
The H. pylori urea breath test is primarily used to check for the presence of H. pylori infection. It is recommended that women who are breastfeeding or pregnant, who have had upper gastrointestinal bleeding within a week, or who have used bismuth such as bismuth potassium citrate and bismuth pectin, proton pump inhibitors such as rabeprazole and omeprazole, and antibiotics such as cefixime and amoxicillin in the last month, avoid the H. pylori Urea Breath Test.