What are the symptoms of gallstones and how are they treated?

Gallstones are a common type of stones that can cause indigestion, right rib and back pain, bloating, and nausea. Patients with acute gallstones may also experience symptoms of jaundice and chills. Gallstones are extremely harmful to your health and must be treated promptly. If the condition is severe, surgery can be used as a treatment option.

1. Clinical features are mainly manifested as:

(1) The patients are younger than those with gallstones, and some of them have congenital abnormalities of the intrahepatic bile duct. Patients often have a history of recurrent abdominal pain, chills, fever, and jaundice since childhood.

(2) Liver function is impaired, but gallbladder function may be normal. During the recurrent attack period, various liver function abnormalities may occur, and alkaline phosphatase may increase during the intermittent period. Long-term illness may lead to atrophy of liver lobe segments and liver fibrosis.

(3) Abdominal pain, jaundice, and fever are the main symptoms, but typical severe colic rarely occurs.

(4) Complications are numerous and severe. The more common ones include suppurative intrahepatic cholangitis, liver abscess, and bile duct bleeding.

(5) Cholangiography can show dilatation of the intrahepatic bile ducts without dilatation of the extrahepatic bile ducts, and small radiolucencies in the hepatic ducts.

II. Treatment

There are many treatments for gallstones. Currently, there are two main methods for treating gallstones, one of which is surgical treatment. The other is non-surgical treatment, which is symptomatic treatment of Chinese and Western medicine, Chinese medicine drug treatment and other therapies. Both treatments have their pros and cons.

Surgical treatment of gallstones can be divided into general surgery and minimally invasive surgery.

1. General surgical treatment

For some larger stones that are not responsive to medication, direct gallbladder removal can be performed surgically. This can quickly eradicate the lesions and is currently the best method. But there are certain indications for surgery.

2. Minimally invasive surgery

It only requires three small incisions of 2 to 3 centimeters on the abdomen. The surgical method is simple, involves little trauma, and allows for quick recovery. However, it is difficult to remove small stones with minimally invasive surgery, and it may also induce stones.