I spent a week in bed in excruciating pain, throwing up blood regularly. The doctor visited a couple of times, I'm not sure what he told my mother, but it was a week before he agreed I should go to hospital.
At that stage I was severely anemic and had peritonitis. I ended up in surgery to have a third of my stomach and some of my small intestine removed. A couple of weeks in intensive care and another few weeks in the children's ward before I was strong enough to go home.
When I left, I was told that I shouldn't eat acidic or spicy foods, and that I had an ulcer because of stress. I was 10, and I can tell you, while we didn't have a whole lot, I was far from being stressed.
Nearly 40 years later that surgery still impacts on my life. I still have some digestion issues, but knowing that Warren's & Marshall's work has prevented others from repeating my experiences has been some comfort.
Good on your doctor for trying something experimental which had such a great outcome.
My dad has a large amount of scar tissue in his stomach from repeated ulcers. They magically went away when the doc lit a cigarette and told him they were gonna remove part of his stomach if it happened again. Never had an ulcer after that. Instead he would break out in hives when his stress level rose.
For the money he/she would get for doing the invasive procedure. This happens even in developed countries.