Cystic arterial patterns in diseased human gall bladders.

Over the last 20 years various authors have suggested that local vascular factors may play some part in the aetiology of certain diseases of the gall bladder (Eliason and Stephens, 1944; Goldman, Morgan, and Kay, 1948; Hallendorf, Dockerty, and Waugh, 1948; Strohl, Diffenbaugh, Baker, and Cheema, 1962; Thomas and Womack, 1952). This paper describes an attempt to establish whether the gross arterial architecture of the diseased gall bladder differs from that of the normal organ, and whether any such differences can be correlated with the nature of the local disease. Using a technique developed in a comparative anatomical study of man and 34 other species (Gordon, 1967), the arterial patterns found in 48 diseased gall bladders were compared with those found in 75 normal gall bladders. This technique involved injecting the gall bladder arteries with Micropaque, filling the lumen of the organ with a translucent resin, and rendering the wall transparent with a clearing agent. The injected arteries then showed up clearly against the translucent gall bladder.