[Stenocardia caused by gallbladder disease. Physiopathological and clinical findings]

10 elderly patients suffering from chronic lithiasic cholecystitis presented sporadic attacks of angor during the digestion of rather abundant meals, associated or otherwise with biliary colic. A clinical study was carried out in order to throw light on the close dependence of pain attacks with cholecystic stress. Observations confirmed the possibility that the onset of angor is due to reflex coronary vasoconstriction induced through the sympathetic system by stimuli arising in the gall bladder. The hypothesis is advanced that coronary impairment, however slight, is necessary for such vasoconstriction to be possible. Attention is called to the syndromes insofar as removal of the irritation in the gall bladder is almost always followed by complete remission of the coronary phenomenology.