My mom is 80 yrs. old and has been diagnosed with haital hernia, gallstones, h-pylori, and she is on high blood pressure meds and Lipitor.

Her doc gave her a round of antibiotics for h-pylori and said she should be cured. I told her not to take his word for it and insist on another test, and sure enough, he did another endoscope and she still has h-pylori. He gave her another round of antibiotics and he's telling her it's gone now, but of course we know she should be tested again, we aren't taking his word for it.

Now besides all the symptoms of h-pylori, belching, feeling full, nausea, etc. she is getting pain in the middle below her chest and needed to vomit today after she had a turkey and cheese sandwich, fruit juice, and an apple for lunch.

I don't know if it's her gallstones, h-pylori, or the haital hernia causing the pain. Of course her doc wants her to go to a surgeon on a consult to get her gall bladder removed. I told her what if it's the h-pylori and you have your gall bladder removed for nothing.

To complicate matters, Mom has a boyfriend, and I told her they could be passing the h-pylori back and forth by kissing, and showed her documentation from the CDC in Atlanta that states oral to oral contact can cause transmission of h-pylori. Her boyfriend took the article to his doc and asked for a blood test and the doc said it was impossible to pass h-pylori through saliva and wouldn't give him the blood test! The doc said you could only get it orally via fecal matter, like if a baby touched is diaper and the put his finger in his mouth.

I called the CDC in Atlanta myself and the h-pylori rep. said yes it is possible to get h-pylori via kissing, but not likely, because many more people would have h-pylori if that was the case.

I was thinking if Mom got h-pylori in a restaurant from dirty water for example, then her boyfriend could have it too because they go to the same places, and he should be tested for that reason alone. I told Mom not to go near her boyfriend until he is tested just in case they are transmitting it to each other, and we had an argument about it, she doesn't want to listen to me.

I don't know if her symptoms are gall bladder related or from h-pylori or both,
and if her boyfriend and her are infecting each other she is never going to get better from the h-pylori.

Does anyone have any suggestions?

Thanks!