Over a 5-year period 82 patients underwent 244 fibreoptic endoscopic dilatations for oesophageal stricture. A total of 55 patients had benign peptic oesophageal stricture caused by reflux oesophagitis. Two-thirds of these patients had good symptomatic relief with dilatation combined with medical treatment of reflux, whereas one-third had an unsatisfactory result. The practice of endoscopic dilatation in benign stricture proved to be safe and was cost-effective as the procedure was carried out under intravenous sedation on a day-care basis. Three patients underwent dilatation for achalasia with good results in two cases. There were 16 patients with malignant oesophageal stricture and, in this group, fibreoptic endoscopic dilatation had little role to play in relieving dysphagia and its practice was associated with a substantial morbidity and mortality. Dilatation of malignant strictures facilitated biopsy and was used prior to oesophageal intubation. The virtues of the Atkinson or Celestin tube put in with the Nottingham introducer are summarised. Eight patients developed anastomotic stricture after resection of carcinoma of the oesophagus and dilatation provided only very transient relief of dysphagia in this group. Most anastomotic strictures represented recurrent malignancy and the difficulty in gaining biopsy proof endoscopically is emphasised. We advocate the early use of a CT scan in this situation to make the diagnosis of recurrent malignancy so that, if appropriate, palliative treatment can be instituted while the patient's general condition is good enough to benefit from it.
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