Percutaneous management of pancreatic fluid collections

Percutaneous catheter drainage of both infected and non-infected pancreatic fluid collections is a safe, efficacious procedure. The results of this procedure depend upon proper selection of patients based upon their clinical status as well as the morphological findings depicted by computed tomography and endoscopic retrograde cholangiopancreatography, careful preprocedural planning and execution of the drainage procedure, good catheter care with follow-up imaging and contrast studies, and attention to the criteria of catheter removal. An average success rate of 80% should be expected with a complication rate of about 15%.