Minimally invasive treatment for gallstone disease

  1.Minimally invasive endoscopic treatment of gallstone disease Gallstone disease is a common disease in China, especially intra- and extrahepatic bile duct stones, which are characterized by extensive lesions, complex conditions, high complication rates, and high rates of postoperative residual stones or recurrence of the disease, traditional treatment methods are mainly liver surgery and bile duct stenosis shaping. In recent years, with the improvement and maturity of endoscopic level, minimally invasive biliary endoscopic surgery is changing the pattern of traditional biliary surgery in China. Biliary endoscopy is not only used for gallbladder stones and extrahepatic bile duct stones, but also for the treatment of hepatobiliary stones, which makes the treatment of gallstone disease more and more perfect and standardized and systematic. So far, the main endoscopes for minimally invasive treatment of gallstone disease include fiber/electronic choledochoscopy, duodenoscopy, and subcholedochoscopy.  2.How to use choledochoscopy technology for minimally invasive treatment of hepatobiliary stones Traditional surgical methods for hepatobiliary stones have a postoperative incidence of residual stones as high as 30%-90% and are very blind and limited, which can cause complications such as bile duct injury, biliary bleeding, sphincter of Oddi and duodenal injury. Intraoperative and postoperative use of choledochoscopy is of great value in improving the efficacy of hepatobiliary stones and can result in a significant decrease in the residual stone rate of bile duct stones. Intraoperative choledochoscopic stone extraction not only visualizes the lesions of the bile ducts, but also provides guidance for the selection of the surgical procedure for intrahepatic bile duct stones.  The value of intraoperative choledochoscopy is that the whole picture of the intra- and extrahepatic bile ducts can be observed, stones can be retrieved under direct vision of the choledochoscope, and for larger embedded stones, plasma noninvasive lithotripsy can be used. The use of choledochoscopy technology can improve the results of surgical procedures such as extrahepatic choledochotomy, drainage and bile-intestinal anastomosis, which are still commonly used.  For patients with T-tube, choledochoscopic extraction via T-tube fistula can be performed 6-8 weeks after surgery, without anesthesia and re-operation, which is less painful and traumatic, and can be done on an outpatient basis. Transcholangioscopic lithotripsy and lithotripsy are follow-up treatments for residual and/or recurrent hepatobiliary duct stones, and the stone retrieval rate can be as high as 97%-99%.