[Internistic diagnosis of the parenchymatous epigastric organs (author's transl)]

Since endoscopy became part of routine diagnostic measures in epigastric diseases, less weight has been attached to x-ray examinations, although the range of application of radiological diagnosis has widened rather than narrowed. In the first place this must be ascribed to the combined diagnostic methods of endoscopic retrograde cholangio-pancreaticography (ERCP), percutaneous transhepatic cholangiography (PTC) and to a limited extent also to percutaneous transjugular cholangiography (PTJC). All three methods are typical examples of the increasing importance of teamwork between the internist engaged in gastroenterology and the radiologist. Other methods, too, the application of which is being practised both by internists and radiologists, are growing in importance, such as sonography and computerised tomography. However, the decisive factor is that today the indication for radiological examinations can be determined in a much more selective fashion than only a few years age: enzymological and serological laboratory and functional investigations are now being used as routine and screening methods and will enable the internist to direct pointed questions at the radiologist. X-ray diagnostics can hold its own within the framework of internistic general diagnostics only if it pays more attention to the more refined examination methods.