Is the Steroid Ulcer a Myth?

Corticosteroids, after all, do lead to ulcers in the stomach and duodenum, according to Messer and his colleagues in this issue of the Journal.1 Their confirmation of that much-buffeted notion makes opportune some historical, clinical, and statistical animadversions.The idea that steroids might lead to such ulcers did not owe its origin, as they suggest, simply to the "accumulation of early anecdotal reports. . . ." Instead, it was an expectation that stemmed from Selye's observations of the alarm reaction and how stress produced acute ulcers.2 In the late 1940s, ACTH and compound F seemed to be the physiologic . . .