[Acute pancreatitis: clinical and therapeutic study with somatostatin]

A clinical and therapeutical study of 47 patients with the diagnosis of acute pancreatitis is reported. According to Ranson's criteria patients were initially classified as suffering from mild (28) and severe (18) acute pancreatitis. Twenty-eight, 11, 7 and 1 patients had biliary, alcoholic, idiopathic and neoplastic causes, respectively, of their conditions. The classification of episodes was made on the basis of clinical manifestations, biologic investigations, and imaging diagnosis, and is shown in the corresponding tables. The therapeutic profile was a randomized double-blind study: perfused somatostatin (SS) versus placebo (P) (physiologic saline 0.9%). The administration of somatostatin in perfusion (250 mcg/h/48 hours) did not improve significantly the parameters used to score the severity, although the mortality rate decreased significantly (p < 0.05) in the group of patients with the severe form of the disease.