Clinical evaluation of a newly developed single-balloon enteroscope.

Background: Double-balloon enteroscopy (DBE) is a useful and epoch-making technique for small-bowel diseases. The single-balloon enteroscope (SBE) is a new instrument introduced by Olympus.

Objective: To evaluate a prototype of the SBE.

Design: A prospective case series.

Setting: Kyoto Second Red Cross Hospital, between April 2006 and July 2007.

Patients: We used the SBE system to perform 37 enteroscopic examinations on 27 patients, including 22 oral and 15 anal approaches.

Main Outcome Measurements: The rate of whole small-bowel visualization, mean time necessary for the investigation, discovery rate of lesions, and complications.

Results: We observed the entire small intestine in 1 of 8 cases (12.5%) that we examined. The mean (+/-SD) time necessary for the oral approach was 83 +/- 38 minutes and that for the anal approach was 90 +/- 32 minutes. The preparation time was less than 5 minutes in both approaches. Small-intestinal lesions were detected in 11 of the 27 patients (40.7%). Perforation occurred in one case as a complication, but the injury healed without surgical intervention.

Limitation: This was a single-center study.

Conclusions: Use of the SBE system in the endoscopic study of the small intestine makes it possible to observe the entire small intestine and to diagnose lesions; thus, the SBE system is a useful instrument for small-bowel diseases. However, the rate of whole small-bowel visualization was inferior to the DBE system.