Intrapancreatic lithiasis

Biliary anatomic variations are usually asymptomatic, but they may cause problems in diagnostic investigations and interventional and surgical procedures, increasing both their technical difficulty and their postoperative complication rates. The aim of the present study was to evaluate the prevalence of anatomic variations in the intrahepatic biliary ducts (IHBD) in relation to demographical and clinical characteristics in a large study population requiring magnetic resonance cholangiopancreatography (MRCP) for various clinical conditions...

Lemmel syndrome is a rare and misdiagnosed cause of acute abdominal pain due to a juxtapapillary duodenal diverticulum causing mechanical obstruction of the common bile duct. Frequently, patients suffering from Lemmel syndrome have a history of recurrent access to the emergency room for acute abdominal pain referable to a biliopancreatic obstruction, in the absence of lithiasis nuclei or solid lesions at radiological examinations. Ultrasonography (US) may be helpful in evaluation of upstream dilatation of extra-/intra-hepatic biliary duct, but computed tomography (CT) is the reference imaging modality for the diagnosis of periampullary duodenal diverticula compressing the intrapancreatic portion of the common bile duct...

The case of a 34 year-old woman with multiple lithiasis of Wirsung's duct who underwent a modified Puestow's operation is presented. Two (2) months after the surgery, the patient entered with a severe pain chart compatible with acute pancreatitis as a result of chronic pancreatitis. A very large lithiasis is observed in the head of the pancreas. Therapeutic procedure, pancreatic sphincterotomy and mechanical lithotripsy are performed. The procedure is described and the literature is reviewed.

BACKGROUND/AIMS: Reports on the late postoperative complications in patients with pancreaticobiliary maljunction (PBM) are limited. METHODOLOGY: Eighteen PBM patients with biliary dilatation and 12 without biliary dilatation were surgically treated at our institute. These 30 PBM patients were retrospectively reviewed, with particular attention to late postoperative complications. RESULTS: Nineteen patients without biliary malignancies underwent resection of the extrahepatic bile duct (BD) and hepaticojejunostomy...

We present a case of annular pancreas associated with pancreatolithiasis. A 41 year-old Japanese man with epigastric pain was admitted to the surgical service at Miyazaki Medical College Hospital. Contrast duodenography revealed severe stenosis of the descending duodenum. Cholangiography showed a stenotic segment of the intrapancreatic common bile duct surrounded by calcifications. Computed tomography of the abdomen revealed calcifications in the posterior region of the pancreatic head. Percutaneous cannulation of the pancreatic ductal system, using ultrasonic guidance, demonstrated a slightly dilated pancreatic duct in the body, stenosis of the duct of Wirsung in the pancreatic head, a normal duct of Santorini, and calcifications in the duct of an annular pancreas which communicated with the duct of Wirsung...

This study was performed to clarify the movement of calcium in the pancreas of dogs with chronic pancreatitis, using scanning and transmission electron microscopes (SEM, TEM) equipped with X-ray elemental microanalyzers. Eleven adult mongrel dogs underwent incomplete ligation of the pancreatic duct. After the procedure, the levels of pancreatic enzymes in the serum did not change for 9 mo, but the endocrine function was reduced gradually. Of all dogs, 5 revealed pancreatic sclerosis, and 2 at 9 mo had calculi, 2-4 mm in size, in the small pancreatic duct...

The existence of dilatation of the Wirsung duct distal to an isthmic calculus, the marked dilatation of the cephalic portion of the duct contrasting with the sub-normal calibre of the corporeo-caudal duct in a case of pancreatic lithiasis, are all against the pathogenic hypothesis of a retrodilatation proximal to an obstruction, a supposition which is apparently satisfactory but not always confirmed by the facts. Thus duct distension would not seem to be a purely mechanical phenomenon. The confusing topography of sectorial dilatation of the Wirsung duct in chronic pancreatitis may be explained by a process affecting in isolation or predominantly one or another embryonic sector...