Do you know about the minimally invasive treatment of common bile duct stones – “double-scope combination”?

  With the maturation and perfection of laparoscopic and cholangioscopic techniques, the concept of minimally invasive treatment of extrahepatic bile duct stones is gradually accepted by the majority of doctors and patients. The clinical management of gallbladder stones combined with common bile duct stones has increasingly adopted minimally invasive treatment.  Based on thousands of laparoscopic cholecystectomies and hundreds of fiberoptic choledochoscopic stone retrievals successfully, I first performed the first laparoscopic choledochal exploration in Nanjing Provincial People’s Hospital in October 2008 after learning laparoscopic common bile duct exploration technology, and have successfully completed more than 300 cases of laparoscopic common bile duct excision and stone retrieval. The best results are laparoscopic common bile duct lithotomy and one-stage suturing of common bile duct, all patients have no complications after surgery and are discharged from hospital 4-5 days after surgery.  The laparoscopic cholecystectomy + common bile duct extraction with one stage suture requires the use of laparoscope and fiberoptic choledochoscope, which is the so-called dual-scope combined treatment. Compared with traditional open surgery, it reduces the surgical trauma of large abdominal incisions and reduces the possibility of many complications of open surgery.  The placement of T-tubes after common bile duct exploration has been continued for more than 100 years. The placement of T-tubes can effectively prevent bile leakage and is more conducive to postoperative choledochoscopy and treatment of residual bile duct stones. However, long-term placement of T-tubes can produce many physiological and psychological discomforts, including loss of bile resulting in electrolyte imbalance, poor digestive function, and increased chances of biliary tract infection.  The laparoscopic common bile duct exploration technique has a 5-10 times magnification effect and a good field of view, which makes the biliary suture very clear and reliable, and the quality of the suture can be close to the microsurgery level.  The development of this new minimally invasive technology has minimized the pain of patients with common bile duct stones and fully reflected the advantages of minimally invasive surgery, which is the best choice for common bile duct stone surgery and will bring more gospel to patients with gallstone disease in our city.