In the United States, cirrhosis is the leading non-malignant cause of death in hepatobiliary-digestive diseases, with an annual mortality rate of about 30,000. Patients with cirrhosis often die from complications of portal hypertension. One of the most serious, common and fatal complications is rupture of esophageal varices as a result of portal hypertension.

With the development of gastrointestinal endoscopy, a number of recent studies have shown that cirrhosis is associated with the development and progression of portal hypertension. In addition to the main picture of portal hypertension commonly seen on endoscopic examination of mucosal mosaicism, erosive lesions have also been detected in the stomach of cirrhotic patients and have been classified by some authors as a form of portal hypertension.

The main cause of portal hypertension is cirrhosis - the end stage of any chronic liver disease. Patients with cirrhosis present clinically with 2 main syndromes: hepatic dysfunction syndrome and portal hypertension.