A “Nobel” Experiment

In 2005, Barry Marshall and Robin Warren were awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine “for their discovery of the bacterium Helicobacter pylori and its role in gastritis and peptic ulcer disease."

When Dr. Marshall was starting his work, the world was not a kind place for ulcer patients. The view in the medical community at the time was that ulcers were caused mainly due to stress; they were described as a “psychosomatic” affliction. Consistent with this view, the standard treatment was some concoction of antidepressants and tranquilizers. But Marshall knew better. As a result of their studies at the Royal Perth Hospital, the duo of Marshall and Warren had formulated a bold hypothesis: gastritis was caused by the bacterium Helicobacter pylori. The basis for this hypothesis were biopsies and cultures they had taken from infected patients. Things didn’t end there; the duo also observed the incidence of gastritis in several patients suffering from stomach cancer, and without Helicobacter they could see no gastritis. A wild idea started to form in their minds, the possibility that both gastritis and stomach cancer could be targeted with one stone, a rather simple stone at that - antibiotics that would clear the bacteria from the stomach.

As a result of his work, Dr. Marshall started treating his own ulcer patients with antibiotics, and was quite successful. It soon became apparent that convincing the rest of the medical world would be quite the challenging task; they clung on to the view that gastritis and ulcers were caused due to stress, and maintained what was the standard treatment at the time. One can only imagine the torment going through Dr. Marshall’s mind, in particularly bad cases of ulcers, patients often bled to death or had surgery to have their stomachs removed. All the while he was confident that he had found the cure, but just couldn’t convince anyone or any journal to take him seriously.

One might think that animal models would have been the way to go for the duo to prove their hypothesis, however this wasn't the case, since Helicobacter pylori doesn’t typically affect rodents. This meant that mouse models were out of the question! How in the world was Dr. Marshall going to prove that infection by the bacterium was indeed the cause of gastritis? Of course he couldn't experiment on humans. Well, all but one human that is.

Dr. Marshall geared up to infect himself with H. pylori. A few days before doing so, he had an endoscopy of his gut done to prove that it was free from bacteria. Dr. Marshall then cultured up the bacteria from the gut of an infected patient, and determined which combination of antibodies it was sensitive to (a precautionary measure!). The only thing left was to gulp the culture down and hope for the best (ironically that was gastritis in this case). Lo and behold, symptoms began to show. Dr. Marshall slowly lost his appetite, his breath started to stink, and he started vomiting.

He had an endoscopy of his gut done after 10 days, and saw bacteria everywhere! He also saw lots and lots of pus cells among other things. Dr. Marshall also cultured the bacteria from his own gut. There were no doubts anymore about the cause of gastric ulcers, and by extension, stomach cancer. The incidence of these two ailments has since drastically reduced around the world, proof that unconventional methods often yield surprising and wonderful results.