Treatment of liver and kidney cysts

  With the popularity of ultrasound, more and more liver and kidney cysts are being readily detected. Most of them are found accidentally and unexpectedly, and it is true that fewer patients with cysts are actually seen specifically for having symptoms. However, for the majority of patients, once they learn that they have liver and kidney cysts, they will be reckoning over and over again in their minds: how did the cysts come about, what adverse effects they will have on my health, and how to get rid of them?  I. What is the core of liver and kidney cyst treatment?  There are two core points in the treatment of liver and kidney cysts, namely, removing the cystic fluid to eliminate the occupying effect and destroying the endothelial cells of the cyst wall to break its function of continuing to secrete fluid. All treatment means should be closely focused on these two central points.  Second, how should the treatment of liver and kidney cysts be chosen?  So far, there are no effective medical drugs that can block the secretory function of cystic endothelial cells or promote the absorption of existing cystic fluid. Surgical intervention is the main treatment option for cysts, among which ultrasound-guided puncture and aspiration combined with anhydrous ethanol sclerotherapy is the most widely used. This treatment technique has the advantage of being precise and minimally invasive, while meeting the two core points of cyst treatment. Numerous clinical studies have confirmed that percutaneous puncture and aspiration combined with anhydrous ethanol sclerotherapy has definite and reliable results. Although MRI, X-ray CT and other imaging techniques can also guide the puncture treatment process, they are far less concise, convenient and fast than ultrasound guidance, which has long been a consensus among physicians in the imaging field.  The important role of ultrasound imaging in the process of ultrasound-guided cyst sclerotherapy is reflected in the accurate guidance of the puncture needle, dynamic monitoring of the cyst wall collapse as the cyst fluid is aspirated, and the distribution of sclerosing agent in the cyst cavity when it is injected, which is an important technical aid for cyst sclerotherapy. The cyst fluid in liver and kidney cysts is produced by the secretion of cyst wall cells, so it is easy to recur by aspiration of cyst fluid only. Sclerotherapy is used to close the cyst wall vascular and lymphatic cavity, and the combination of cyst wall epithelial cells and sclerosing agent can cause cell protein coagulation and denaturation, cell destruction, and sterile inflammation, so that the cyst cavity is coagulated, sclerosed, and closed by adhesions, and finally absorbed and disappeared. This method is safe, minimally invasive, convenient, and has been accepted by the majority of patients, and has now risen from an adjunctive treatment method for liver and kidney cysts to a dominant treatment program.  The most commonly encountered adverse reaction to the use of anhydrous ethanol sclerotherapy for liver and kidney cysts is irritating pain, the degree of which varies from person to person, and in severe cases, deficiency may occur, requiring first aid. The most likely reason for this is that ethanol directly stimulates the nociceptive nerve endings distributed in the epithelial layer of the cyst lining or/and in the fibrous layer beneath it, and individual differences in the distribution of nociceptive nerve endings and in the size of the nociceptive field lead to differences in the degree of pain. Since the volume of ethanol injected is much less than the volume of the cystic fluid, the possibility of ethanol leakage outside the cystic cavity to irritate the peritoneum is relatively low unless the amount of ethanol used is close to the volume of the cystic fluid. For pain relief, injection of a 2% lidocaine solution into the dried out cystic cavity prior to ethanol injection usually reduces and relieves nociception.  Despite the low cost and clear efficacy of anhydrous ethanol, we are currently running out of sterile anhydrous ethanol in ampoules suitable for the treatment of liver and kidney cysts in China. Many patients share their doctors’ anxiety about this, because there are too many patients with cysts that need treatment, and the patients’ feelings are too urgent, especially for polycystic liver and polycystic kidney.  Currently, there are reports in the literature of successful treatment of liver and kidney cysts with a new sclerosing agent “polyglaucine”. Polyglaucine was first used to treat esophagogastric varices and saphenous varices, and is a sclerotherapy agent for venous bleeding. Para-venous injection can cause fibrosis around varicose veins and compress varicose veins; intra-venous injection can damage the endothelium of blood vessels and promote thrombosis and obstruction of blood vessels. Polyglaucine itself has the local analgesic effect of local anesthetic. Practice shows that the sclerotherapy effect of polycinnamol on liver and kidney cysts is completely comparable to that of anhydrous ethanol, with an efficiency of 100% (cysts shrink by more than 50%) and a cure rate of 78% (cysts disappear). There were almost no adverse reactions common to anhydrous ethanol, such as severe abdominal pain and dizziness, vomiting, palpitations, chest tightness, skin flushing, and general weakness, when using polyglactin, which is very similar to the degree of side effects reported in foreign literature. In this way, the patient’s comfort and acceptance of polyglactin was greatly improved.