Percutaneous interventional gallbladder procedures: personal experience and literature review.

Our experience with 58 percutaneous gallbladder procedures in 48 patients are discussed. Diagnostic procedures consisted of needle aspiration of bile (n = 5) to evaluate the gallbladder as a source of infections and transcholecystic cholangiography (TCC) (n = 32) for bile duct visualization. Percutaneous cholecystostomy (PC) (n = 21) was performed for gallbladder or bile duct decompression or stone dissolution.

Common bile duct calculi: updated experience with dissolution with methyl tertiary butyl ether.

The authors describe their experience with methyl tertiary butyl ether (MTBE) in a larger series of patients than previously reported in order to acquaint physicians with both its effectiveness for dissolution of common bile duct calculi and the limitations of its use. Ten patients with 13 biliary calculi underwent percutaneous stone dissolution treatment with the experimental cholesterol solvent, MTBE. Three stones completely dissolved within 30 minutes, seven were reduced in size, and three were visibly unaffected.

Monooctanoin infusion and stone removal through the transparenchymal tract: use in 17 patients.

Seventeen patients underwent monooctanoin infusion and biliary stone removal through the percutaneous transhepatic biliary drainage tract. In the first five patients, monooctanoin was infused until the stone(s) became smaller or disappeared; basket extraction was not attempted until this reduction was observed. An average of 22 hospital days was required for the procedure.

Common bile duct obstruction: assessment by transcholecystic cholangiography.

Percutaneous transcholecystic cholangiography was performed in 20 patients. Fifteen patients had normal-sized bile ducts on sonograms and computed tomographic scans, and five had partial common bile duct obstruction. Gallbladder pressures were measured in 14 patients.

Percutaneous transhepatic removal of a common bile duct stone after mono-octanoin infusion.

Small biliary calculi discovered after the T-tube track has closed can be removed with a percutaneous transhepatic biliary catheter. Mono-octanoin can be used to reduce the size of large calculi for percutaneous extraction.