The following are the most important diseases or complications that may be contributed to by cholelithiasis (gallstones):
Endocrine, nutritional, and metabolic diseases (E00-E90).
- Diabetes mellitus type 2
Cardiovascular system (I00-I99)
- Increased risk of cardiovascular disease (here: apoplexy/stroke, myocardial infarction/heart attack).
Liver, gallbladder and bile ducts – pancreas (pancreas) (K70-K77; K80-K87).
- Acute cholangitis (bile duct inflammation) – pathognomonic (evidence of disease): high fever, timely upper abdominal pain, and jaundice/ jaundice (= Charcot triad); complications:
- Gallbladder empyema/gangrene
- Gallbladder perforation (rupture of the gallbladder):
- Free abdominal cavity: peritonitis (peritonitis).
- Covered perforation: subhepatic abscess (encapsulated pus cavity under the liver).
- Into the intestinal tract: gallstone ileus/bowel obstruction due to gallstone (aerobilie/gas accumulation in the bile ducts!
- Acute cholecystitis (95% of acute cholecystitis develops on the ground of cholecystolithiasis).
- Choledocholithiasis (presence of calculi in the choledochal duct/main bile duct); complications:
- Acute cholangitis (see above).
- Recurrent cholangitis (recurrent inflammation of the bile ducts) → secondary biliary cirrhosis (disease of the liver in which chronic backlog of bile in the liver leads to damage to the liver cells with the formation of cirrhosis)
- Liver abscesses (encapsulated accumulation of pus in the liver).
- Acute biliary pancreatitis (stone impaction at the papilla Vateri/mucosal fold in the duodenum); symptoms: Acute abdominal pain (abdominal pain) most important symptom; typically, severe, probing, and persistent visceral pain in the upper abdomen (epigastrium) that may also radiate to the back (girdled), thorax, flanks, or lower abdomen and improves in a sitting or crouching position [amylase and lipase ↑]
- Cholecystitis (gallbladder inflammation), chronic recurrent; complications:
- Porcelain gallbladder – gallbladder with thickened and calcified gallbladder wall visible on x-ray.
- Gallbladder carcinoma (see below neoplasms).
- Liver damage
- Pancreatitis (inflammation of the pancreas)
- Mirizzi syndrome – rare form of occlusive icterus (jaundice) due to displacement/narrowing of the bile ducts (occurs when the ductus hepaticus communis, i.e. the bile duct located outside the liver, is compressed by a concretion (stone) in the neck of the gallbladder or in the ductus cysticus (bile duct))
Mouth, esophagus (food pipe), stomach, and intestines (K00-K67; K90-K93).
- Gallstone ileus – intestinal obstruction caused by gallstones.
Neoplasms – tumor diseases (C00-D48)
- Cholangiocellular carcinoma (bile duct cancer).
- Carcinoma of the small intestine
- Gallbladder carcinoma
- Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC; liver cancer)
- Pancreatic carcinoma (pancreatic cancer).
Symptoms and abnormal clinical and laboratory findings not elsewhere classified (R00-R99).
- Icterus (jaundice; congestive icterus).
