[Stage I cholelithiasis. Approaches to diagnosis and treatment. Results of the Machaon study]

To review the results of the open observational study Makhaon on the use of a fixed combination of glycyrrhizic acid (GA) and ursodeoxycholic acid (UDCA) (Phosphogliv Urso) for the treatment of abdominal pain, assessment of contractile function of the gallbladder and bile rheology in patients with stage I cholelithiasis.

The study included 330 subjects, 44.5% males and 55.5% females. The study participants were 18-70 years old, with a mean age of 43.8±0.6 years. In 2021-2022, patients were treated in 14 clinical centers in 10 cities of the Russian Federation: Moscow, St. Petersburg, Stavropol, Volgograd, Perm, Samara, Ufa, Omsk, Novosibirsk, Tomsk. All patients received Phosphogliv Urso (UDCA 250 mg + sodium glycyrrhizinate 35 mg), 1 capsule 3 times daily with food for 6 months.

Based on the clear improvement, therapy with a combination of GA and UDCA has demonstrated high efficacy and safety and appears to be optimal for the treatment of abdominal pain, improvement of the contractile function of the gallbladder, and physicochemical properties of bile in patients with stage I cholelithiasis.

Treating all variants of baseline changes in the bile rheology is an urgent task of modern biliology. Universal drugs for stage I cholelithiasis are UDCA and its fixed combination with GA.