sonographic changes of liver and gallbladder in acute viral hepatitis1

hepatomegaly, decrease in the liver paranchymal echo and increase in the gallbladder wall thickness has been shown in acute viral hepatitis. the present study was done to determine sonographic changes in acute viral hepatitis. we performed liver and bile ducts sonography and specific tests on 42 patients (mean age: 31.5 and 61% male) with acute viral hepatitis. gallbladder wall thickness was seen in 45.2% and hepatomegaly in 33.3% of patients and liver paranchymal echo was decreased in 19.3%. age, sex, type of hepatitis, cholecystitis like symptoms, aspartate aminotransfrase, alanine aminotransfrase, alkaline phosphatase and bilirubin did not significantly corralate with these changes. only raised prothrombin time was strongly correlated to the thickening of the gallbladder and decrease in the liver paranchymal echo and cholesistic like symptoms we can postulate that thickening of the gallbladder and decrease in the liver paranchymal echo is not dependent on the severity and speed of the paranchymal necrosis (as considered with alt and ast) but they depend on the liver function disturbance (as considered with pt) because the thickening of the gall bladder is present in 45% of the patients and 10% of the normal population have gallbladder stones, one should not perform the diagnosis of acute cholecystitis, only on the basis of sonographic report without attention to the clinical and laboratory data.