Introduction:

Gastrointestinal bleeding is blood loss that originates in the digestive tract.

Objective:

To describe the endoscopic findings in patients evaluated for upper (UGIB) and lower (LGIB) gastrointestinal bleeding that was performed in a second-level care hospital of the ISSSTE in the Mexican state of Oaxaca.

Method:

For 3.5 years, 4285 esophagogastroduodenoscopies and colonoscopies were performed.

Results:

The results of 778 requests are as follows: 74.5% were diagnosed with UGIB and 25.5% with LGIB. The most frequent causes of non-variceal UGIB are peptic ulcer (19%) and erosive gastropathy (15%), and for the variceal UGIB were esophageal varices (23%) and hypertensive gastropathy (13%). In the case of LGIB, the most common causes were hemorrhoids (53.5%) and diverticula (18.5%).

Conclusions:

According to the findings observed in patients evaluated endoscopically, the most common causes for UGIB were peptic ulcer, erosive gastropathy, and esophageal varices; while for patients diagnosed with LGIB, they were hemorrhoids and colonic diverticula.