Mirizzi syndrome and gallstone ileus: An unusual presentation of gallstone disease

We discuss the case of a man with an unusual complication of gallstone disease. An 85-year-old patient presented to the emergency department with a 3-week history of abdominal pain in the right upper abdominal quadrant. Thoracoabdominal radiography demonstrated that the whole extrahepatic biliary tree, including the common bile duct, common hepatic duct, gallbladder, and left and right hepatic ducts, were visibly delineated by air. The operative findings revealed a small shrunken gallbladder, a fistula between the gallbladder fundus and the gastric antrum, and a cholecystohepatic fistula, corresponding to Mirizzi syndrome, type II. A large gallstone was found impacted in the jejunum. This patient seems to have developed initially a cholecystohepatic fistula. Due to the acute inflammatory process, the stone eroded through the gallbladder wall and into the gastric antrum, passing from the antrum into the small bowel, where it became impacted. We suggest that the natural history of Mirizzi syndrome does not end with a cholecystobiliary fistula but that the continuous inflammation in the triangle of Calot may result in a complex fistula involving not only the biliary tract but also the adjacent viscera. (c) 2005 The Society for Surgery of the Alimentary Tract.