Long-term complications of endoscopic biliary sphincterotomy for choledocholithiasis: a North-American perspective.

摘要

Endoscopic sphincter-otomy for choledocholithiasis is a routine procedure, most commonly performed to facilitate stone removal during endoscopic retrograde cholangiopancreatography (ERCP).Earlymorbidityhasbeenreported to occur in as many as 10% of individuals, whereas late complications, including abdominal pain, recurrent stones, liver abscess, cholangitis, and cholangiocarci-noma occur in approximately 7-24% of patients in Asian and European studies (1-5). These studies followed up patients for up to 12 years after sphincterotomy. To our knowledge, there are no published data on long-term outcomes of biliary sphincterotomy for choledocholithiasis in a North-American population. We report our findings in a series of North-American patients followed up over a long term after undergoing biliary sphincterotomy for storie extraction.