ACUTE OBSTRUCTIVE SUPPURATIVE CHOLANGITIS

The clinical courses of twenty-four patients with acute obstructive suppurative cholangitis are described. Conservative treatment, based on modern sophisticated physiologic measurements, and the use of newer potent pharmacologic agents may lead to an improvement in the patient's condition; however, he or she is still at high risk until decompression of the infected biliary tract is carried out. In some cases, operation must be performed upon a moribund patient refractory to all resuscitative measures if survival from this benign disease is to be achieved. Hypoglycemia, thrombocytopenia, and renal shutdown are commonly present in patients with this disease. The possibility that a patient admitted to the hospital with the diagnosis of acute cholecystitis may have or develop acute obstructive suppurative cholangitis should constantly be borne in mind. © 1968.