Gallbladder polyps, also known as gallbladder augmentation lesions, is a general term for all non-stone lesions in which the wall of the gallbladder grows into the lumen in the form of polyps. In recent years, with the popularity of ultrasonography, the chances of gallbladder polyps being detected have increased, and we often encounter such inquiries in the clinic: What should I do if I have gallbladder polyps? Do I need to take medicine or surgery? There is no way to prevent it, etc. I hope it will be helpful to you. 1.How can gallbladder polyps occur? The gallbladder is located in the upper right abdomen, like a pear-shaped bag hanging below the liver, its main function is to collect and store the bile secreted by the liver, and excrete it to the intestines to help digest and absorb food when the body needs it. Gallbladder polyps are superfluous organisms that grow on the inner wall of the gallbladder cavity, ranging from 1 mm to 2 mm in small ones to 2 cm in large ones, and are classified as solitary or multiple according to the number of polyps. There are three types of pathological histology of gallbladder polyps. The first type, cholesterol polyps, is the most common, with more than 95% of polyps belonging to this type. It is formed by the accumulation of cholesterol crystals in the bile after ingestion by macrophages in the gallbladder wall, and often multiple are present at the same time. The second type, called inflammatory polyps, is a local tissue hyperplasia formed during recurrent episodes of cholecystitis and is clinically characterized by the combination of gallbladder stones and chronic cholecystitis in most cases. The third type is adenomatous polyp, which is rare, accounting for only 0.5% of all polyps, and is usually solitary. It is the only real tumor lesion in the three kinds of polyps, although it is a benign tumor, but when it increases to a certain degree, it has the opportunity to evolve into cancer. 2.What harm will gallbladder polyp cause? About 5% of the population suffer from gallbladder polyps, most of which do not cause any symptoms and are only discovered by chance during ultrasound physical examination. A small percentage of people may experience varying degrees of right upper abdominal distention or biliary colic, which may be due to polyps growing near the gallbladder duct. Polyps obstruct the flow of bile from the cystic duct, which is a very thin duct that drains bile outward, causing discomfort and pain due to increased pressure in the cavity of the gallbladder, which can lead to chronic cholecystitis over time. The above-mentioned manifestations in people with polyps combined with stones may be mainly related to stones. There are three different types of gallbladder polyps, cholesterol polyps and inflammatory polyps, which do not cause clinical symptoms and are not harmful to health and life. Adenomatous polyps are tumors that have a tendency to become malignant, and it should be said that this is the greatest potential threat. According to the current level of imaging technology, we can only generally distinguish the nature of polyps, and it is even more difficult to determine whether the polyps are cancerous in the early stage. However, adenomatous polyps are rare, less than 1% in total, and whether malignant changes occur is closely related to the size of the polyps. By summarizing and analyzing a large number of cases, it is found that there is almost no malignant change of polyps below 1 cm, and once the polyps grow more than 1 cm, the chance of cancer increases steeply to 2%-13%, and some medical literature reports even more than 20%. 3. Must gallbladder polyps be removed? For most gallbladder polyps that are found incidentally during physical examination and do not cause any symptoms, the need for treatment depends mainly on the size and growth rate of the polyps. To be clear, there are no drugs that can make the third type of polyps, or true polyps, go away, so injections or medications are not curative. For the first category, which is cholesterol polyps, there is still a chance to control or even disappear by limiting cholesterol intake and taking some choleretic drugs orally. Therefore, these patients can try to take some cholestatic drugs orally. For true polyps, the only way now is to have surgery to remove the whole gallbladder. Of course, if you have a gallbladder polyp and have recurrent episodes of discomfort or pain in the right upper abdomen, and you can rule out that it is caused by other reasons after examination by a doctor, you can consider surgery in this case. If chronic cholecystitis has developed, especially in combination with gallbladder stones, it should of course be treated. Therefore, the specific approach to gallbladder polyps is: polyps of up to 5 mm are found on the first examination and then regularly reviewed by ultrasound once a year. If the polyp is more than 5 mm but does not reach 1 cm, it can be re-examined by ultrasound after half a year and the size does not change once a year; on the contrary, if the polyp increases, it should be followed closely and the interval of review should be shortened. If the polyp size has reached 1 cm or larger, or if it has increased more than 3 mm during follow-up review, cholecystectomy should be performed to exclude the possibility of cancer, and pathological histological evaluation should be done. Overall, the vast majority of asymptomatic gallbladder polyps do not require treatment, and even more so in the case of multiple small polyps, which can basically be diagnosed as cholesterol polyps. Larger polyps require removal of the gallbladder, which is mainly prophylactic and in most cases remains benign after pathological evaluation. As long as the surgery is timely, even if the polyp is malignant, it is still in the early stages and the prognosis is good. After the gallbladder is removed, the bile secreted by the liver is directly discharged into the intestine to perform digestive functions, and the surgery generally has no significant adverse effects on the body.