Prospective comparison between double-balloon enteroscopy and spiral enteroscopy

Push enteroscopy, balloon-guided, and single- and double-balloon enteroscopy (DBE) are now well established techniques in gastrointestinal endoscopy for small-bowel imaging and therapy. There are no published prospective studies comparing DBE with spiral enteroscopy and so the aim of the current study was to compare the performance of the two techniques in patients undergoing diagnostic enteroscopy.

Between January and December 2009, 35 patients referred for diagnostic enteroscopy were prospectively assigned to either spiral enteroscopy (n=18) or DBE (n=17). The performance of the two techniques was compared.

The patients were comparable with regard to age, sex, and indication for enteroscopy. Investigation performance, as assessed by time of insertion into the pylorus, the depth of insertion, the duration of the enteroscopy, and the amount of sedoanalgesia required were not significantly different between spiral enteroscopy and DBE. In 40% of the investigations, enteroscopy could detect abnormalities in the intestinal mucosa, in particular inflammatory changes and ulcers and, to a lesser extent, angiodysplasia. No significant difference in pathological findings could be detected between the two groups; however, clinically, diagnostic yield appeared to be higher for DBE (47.1% vs. 33.4%; n.s.).

Although this small study appears to show that DBE has a clinically higher diagnostic yield than spiral enteroscopy, larger studies are needed to confirm this preliminary finding.