BACKGROUND Cholestatic jaundice (CJ) in patients with sickle cell disease (SCD) poses diagnostic and therapeutic dilemmas. This is an evaluation of the role of ERCP in SCD. METHODS A total of 224 SCD patients with CJ had ERCP. The indications for ERCP were based on clinical and biochemical evidence of CJ and ultrasound findings. RESULTS The indications were: CJ only in79, CJ and dilated duc...

It is still unclear as to the exact mechanisms that lead to bladder stones or a similar condition called hypercalcinuria in the rabbit. Hypercalcinuria is a high calcium content of the urine where large stones do not form, but rather there is an abundance of smaller crystals that cause the urine to be thick, white and difficult to pass. This condition is often referred to as bladder sludge. It ...

The pathogenesis of hemolysis-induced gallstones was studied in mice with a hereditary hemolytic disease called normoblastic anemia (genotype nb/nb) and in their normal controls (genotype +/+). Infrared spectroscopy demonstrated that spontaneously formed gallstones from nb/nb mice were nearly identical to stones from patients with chronic hemolysis as the result of sickle cell disease, and both...

High intakes of calcium, potassium, and fluids have been shown to be associated with lowered risk of kidney stones. The authors studied the associations between diet and risk of kidney stones in a cohort of 27,001 Finnish male smokers aged 50-69 years who were initially free of kidney stones. All men participated in the Alpha-Tocopherol, Beta-Carotene Lung Cancer Prevention Study and completed ...

Correlation of the composition of the urinary calculi with urine pH, especially of diurnal variation, and composition of urinary excretion was studied. Urine pH in the patients with uric acid stones was constantly low and urinary pH in the patients with apatite and struvite stones was always high. Diurnal variation was not observed. In patients with pure calcium oxalate stones, however, urinary...

The factors influencing the migration of gall stones are ill understood. Altogether 331 patients undergoing cholecystectomy were studied prospectively. The diameters of the cystic and common bile ducts and of stones in the gall bladder and bile ducts were measured. Increasing pressure was applied to the freshly excised gall bladder in an attempt to evacuate stones through the cystic duct. Stone...

OBJECTIVES To review previous reports and discuss current trends in extracorporeal shockwave lithotripsy (ESWL), percutaneous nephrolithotomy (PCNL) and ureterorenoscopy (URS). ESWL was recommended as the first-line treatment for small and intermediate-sized stones in the lower pole, while it is the standard treatment for large stones. However, the stone clearance rate after ESWL seems to be lo...

The increased prevalence of gall stones in Crohn's disease is thought to be related to depletion of the bile salt pool due either to terminal ileal disease or after ileal resection. This study was designed to examine whether this hypothesis is correct and explore alternative explanations. Two hundred and fifty one randomly selected patients (156 females, 95 males, mean age 45 years) were interv...

Nephrolithiasis is one of the most frequent urologic diseases. The aim of this paper is to study the composition and frequency of 8854 patient kidney stones and in a subset of them their metabolic risk factors to be related to their type of calculi. Physicochemical and crystallographic methods were used to assess kidney stone composition. In a subset of 715 patients, we performed an ambulatory ...