[Study on the function of the sphincter of Oddi in patients with gallstone disease by dynamic hepatobiliary...

By using hepatobiliary scintigraphy, function of the sphincter of Oddi in 88 patients undergoing cholecystectomy with or without common bile duct exploration and T-tube drainage for gallstone disease was studied. These patients consisted of three groups; 57 patients with gallbladder stones (Group I), 25 with common duct stones migrated from the gallbladder (Group II) and 6 with primary common duct stones (Group III). Time-activity curves (T-A curve) obtained from the region of terminal end of the common bile duct were classified into 4 types which were different from each other. On the T-A curve, the rate of decrease (ROD, %) was defined as the difference between the count rate in the maximum and that at the 20 min after the maximum. The ROD in Group I was significantly greater than that in Group II or III (p less than 0.01). The ROD in Group II was also significantly greater than that in Group III (p less than 0.05). The increase of ROD in Group III after cholecystokinin-pancreozymin administration was less remarkable as compared with that in Group II. Thus, we conclude that the function of the sphincter of Oddi in these three groups may be different from each other.