Positive H. pylori status predicts better prognosis of non-cardiac gastric cancer patients: results from cohort study and meta-analysis

BACKGROUND: Previous researches have associated Helicobacter pylori (H. pylori) with a prognosis of gastric cancer (GC), however, without a concert conclusion. This study aimed to study this issue further by a prospective cohort study and a meta-analysis. METHODS: Histologically diagnosed gastric cancer (GC) patients were recruited into the primary prospective cohort study between January 2009 to December 2013. All the patients were followed-up periodically to record information on post-surgery therapy and overall survival status. The pre-surgery status of H. pylori was measured by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay. A meta-analysis was conducted after retrieving related researches in the databases of PubMed and Embase up to April 2020. Pooled hazard ratios (HRs) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs) were summarized to validate the relationship between H. pylori infection and the survival time of GC patients. I(2) statistics and Q test were used to assess the heterogeneity. Sensitivity analyses were performed using Galbraith’s plot, leave-one-out analysis, subgroup analyses and meta-regression to explore the sources of heterogeneity and the stability of the summary results. RESULTS: A total of 743 GC patients with radical tumorectomy were included prospectively and 516 (69.4%) were positive on H. pylori. H. pylori-positive patients tended to survive longer than -negative ones (HR 0.92, 95%CI: 0.74–1.15), though the tendency was not statistically significant. Cohort studies on the prognosis of GC were retrieved comprehensively by assessing the full-text and 59 published studies, together with the result of our study, were included in the further meta-analysis. The summarized results related the positive status of H. pylori to better overall survival (HR 0.81, 95%CI: 0.72–0.90) and disease-free survival (HR 0.83, 95%CI: 0.67–0.99). Results from subgroup analyses indicated that the pooled magnitude of this association was relatively lower in studies not referring to H. pylori in title and abstract. CONCLUSIONS: In conclusion, gastric cancer patients with H. pylori have a better prognosis than patients of H. pylori negative. More stringent surveillance strategies may be necessary for patients with H. pylori negative at cancer diagnosis. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1186/s12885-022-09222-y.