[Cholestatic hepatopathy: primary biliary cirrhosis]

Primary biliary cirrhosis is a cholestatic autoimmune disease of the liver. Its prevalence has significantly increased over the last seven years, therefore it can no longer be considered to be a rare liver disease. It is seen in 94/100,000 women older than 40 years. The treatment consists of administration of ursodeoxycholic acid, better therapy results seem to be achieved by combining UDCA with immunosuppressants. While UDCA-monotherapy proved to extend the time until liver transplantation and thus leads to life prolongation, this could not yet be shown for the combination therapies. Therapy of the often agonizing pruritus and of osteoporosis remains problematic. Frequently this can only be managed by the combination of several treatment measures.