[A clinical survey on 17 cases of cholelithiasis in childhood (author's transl)]

A series of 17 cases of gallstones in children observed over a period of 10 years in the area of Marseilles is described and the literature reviewed. The majority of children were girls over 10 years old. Symptoms were constantly present and the disease revealed nine times by acute "mechanical" cholecystitis, compared to 16 infectious cholecystitis followed during the same period, three times by an accident of migration (cholangitis in a 14 years old girl, bile ascitis in two infants). A cholecystography should be performed in acute recurrent abdominal pain of unknown origin in children, gallstones appearing to be radiotransparent in six patients. Among causes of gallstone formation, the authors dig out only 6 hemolytic anemias, related to hemoglobinopathies in three patients, and they emphasize the frequency of idiopathic cholelithiasis which should lead to a more complete investigation of the enterohepatic cycle and chemical constitution of bile in such patients.