The aim of this study was to assess the results of different surgical treatments in 100 patients admitted from 1972 to 1984 with perforated pyloric ulcer. Forty-six patients were treated with simple suture, thirty-two patients underwent high selective vagotomy with pyloroplasty, 13 patients were submitted to truncal vagotomy with pyloroplasty and 9 to gastrectomy. This study has shown that high selective vagotomy and pyloroplasty for perforated pyloric ulcer can be performed as safely as simple closure. The overall clinical results according to the Visick classification were recorded as excellent or very good in 85 per cent of patients treated with high selective vagotomy with pyloroplasty versus 38 per cent with similar results in simple closure patients. We conclude that high selective vagotomy with pyloroplasty is not less effective for treatment of pyloric perforated ulcer than for duodenal ulcer; simple closure should be reserved for patients treated long time after perforation and with advanced age or in patients with serious associated pathology.