Introduction/Objective: The discovery of Helicobacter pylori has had a major impact on both research and the management of upper gastrointestinal disease. Most trials have been conducted in secondary care settings, but it is within primary care that most dyspeptic patients are managed. In spite of consensus statements and guidelines, the most effective strategy for managing dyspepsia in this setting remains to be determined. A number of primary care-based randomised trials, funded as a result of the National R&D Programme in the UK, are examining different management strategies for dyspepsia. The Dyspepsia Trials Collaborators' Group represents trials of the management of dyspepsia and population-based trials of Helicobacter pylori eradication therapy. The purpose of the group is to identify prospectively all trials in the area and to pool the results, with synthesis via meta-analysis and modelling as appropriate, with the eventual aim of producing and disseminating evidence-based clinical guidelines for the management of dyspepsia and H. pylori infection in primary care. By being inclusive of all ongoing trials in this area, whose results are as yet unknown, the review will avoid publication bias. 14 primary-care based randomised trials of either dyspepsia management of population screening for H. Pylori have so far been identified in the UK and Europe. Further steps are being taken to increase the coverage of trials in N. America and Australasia. This presentation will describe the ongoing trials and the steps taken to link them in a pre-planned individual patient data meta-analysis.

Methods: Outcomes and data extraction. Management trials: dyspepsia and quality of life scores, cost and resource utilisation measures to enable a wide-ranging cost/effectiveness analysis. Population studies: mortality from gastric cancer, IHD and the incidence of PUD and dyspepsia symptom and quality of life scores. The Cochrane Upper Gastrointestinal and Pancreatic Diseases Group will act as a focus for all the completed analyses which will be carried out in close collaboration with the Cochrane group and to Cochrane format where appropriate.

Discussion: Primary care is an area which is rapidly expanding in importance and research capacity in many countries. The development of multidisciplinary trials collaborators groups is an important new dimension for primary care research, bringing the potential for trial evidence from the primary care setting to be quickly assimilated into systematic reviews and practice.