ABSTRACT
I. BACKGROUND A high proportion of people admitted to hospitals every year with acute upper gastrointestinal (GI) hemorrhage will have bled from a peptic ulcer (Vellacott et aI., 1982). Further hemorrhage after admission (i.e., continued bleeding or rebleeding) is associated with a relatively poor prognosis (Jones et aI., 1973), and medical treatment is directed at preventing this complication and reducing the corresponding high mortality and surgical intervention in these patients.
