What should be done in patients diagnosed with xanthogranulomatous cholecystitis? Case-control study

In this study, we aimed to compare development of complications, malignancy and confusion rates in the preliminary diagnosis in patients with xanthogranulomatous cholecystitis identified.

In this study, 2803 patients undergone cholecystectomy between January 2010 and December 2016 were retrospectively evaluated. Patients with xanthogranulomatous cholecystitis identified in the histopathological examination were classified as Group 1 and patients with cholelithiasis, cholecystitis, and malignancy detected were classified as Group 2.

Forty-five patients with xanthogranulomatous cholecystitis were classified as group 1 and 2758 patients as group 2. of group 1, 18 were male and group 2 consisted of 2758 patients with 707 (26%) being male (p=0.04). In the ultrasonographic examination, the wall thickness was increased in 40 patients in Group 1 and 662 patients in Group 2 (p<0.0001). The operation was converted to the open type in 24 patients in Group 1 and 61 patients in Group 2 (p<0.0001). Five patients in Group 1 and 32 patients in Group 2 developed complications in the postoperative period (p<0.0001).

Xanthogranulomatous cholecystitis should be considered for the differential diagnosis and the operation should be performed, especially by carefully exposing the anatomy in these patients.