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Pathophysiology of Cholesterol Gallstone Disease

  • Chapter
Biliary Lithiasis

Abstract

Gallstone disease is one of the most costly digestive diseases requiring hospitalization in westernized countries, and its prevalence ranges from 10% to 15% in adults in Europe and the USA [1–4]. The burden of disease is summarized by the prevalence of patients with gallstones, by its incidence (over a million new diagnoses of gallstones a year), and by the number of cholecystectomies performed yearly in the USA (approaching 700,000) [5]. Similar trends in gallstone disease have been confirmed in large epidemiological surveys carried out in Italy [6–10]. In Western societies approximately 80% of gallstones are cholesterol gallstones [11], either pure cholesterol or mixed cholesterol stones (containing more than 50% cholesterol by weight).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Internal Medicine and Public Medicine Clinica Medica A. Murri, University of Bari Medical School, Bari, Italy

    Piero Portincasa, Antonio Moschetta, Daniela Pontrelli & Rosa C. Sasso

  2. Department of Translational Pharmacology, Consorzio Mario Negri Sud, Santa Maria Imbaro (Chieti), Italy

    Antonio Moschetta

  3. Division of Internal Medicine, Hospital of Bisceglie, Bisceglie (Bari), Italy

    Agostino Di Ciaula

  4. Gastroenterology Division Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center Department of Medicine, Harvard Medical School, Boston, Massachusetts, USA

    Helen H. Wang & David Q. -H. Wang

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  1. Piero Portincasa
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Portincasa, P. et al. (2008). Pathophysiology of Cholesterol Gallstone Disease. In: Biliary Lithiasis. Springer, Milano. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-88-470-0763-5_3

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