[Diagnosis of necrotizing pancreatitis. Comparison between contrast medium-computed tomography and ultrasonics in a clinical study]

Severe acute pancreatitis: surgical indications and treatment

Background

Acute pancreatitis (AP) is defined as an acute inflammatory attack of the pancreas of sudden onset. Around 25% of patients have either moderately severe or severe disease with a mortality rate of 15–20%.

Purpose

The aim of this article was to summarize the advances being made in the understanding of this disease and the important role of surgery.

Results and conclusions

An accurate diagnosis should be made a soon as possible, initiating resuscitation with large volume intravenous fluids and oxygen by mask. Predicted severe disease will require intensive monitoring. Most deaths within the first week are due to multi-organ failure; thus, these patients will require intensive therapy unit management. During the second phase of the disease, death is due to local complications arising from the pancreatic inflammation, requiring accurate identification to determine the correct form of treatment. Acute peripancreatic fluid collections arise < 4 weeks after onset of interstitial edematous pancreatitis, not requiring any treatment. Most pancreatic pseudocysts arise > 4 weeks and largely resolve on conservative management. Necrotizing pancreatitis causing acute necrotic collections and later walled-off necrosis will require treatment if symptomatic or infected. Initial endoscopic transgastric or percutaneous drainage will resolve less serious collections but necrosectomy using minimally invasive approaches will be needed for more serious collections. To prevent recurrent attacks of AP, causative factors need to be removed where possible such as cholecystectomy and cessation of alcohol. Future progress requires improved management of multi-organ failure and more effective minimally invasive techniques for the removal of necrosis.

Severe acute pancreatitis: when to be concerned?

The fate of a patient with acute pancreatitis largely depends on early recognition of the severity of the disease. Acute pancreatitis is severe when organ failure and/or pancreatic necrosis occur. Whereas simple and low cost parameters are available for the detection of organ failure, the detection and extent of pancreatic necrosis requires a costly contrast-enhanced computed tomography. This is not always available in all institutions. This review article which considers when the clinician should be concerned about his patient diagnosed with acute pancreatitis, summarizes possibilities for diagnosing clinical severe (that is organ failure) and radiological severe (that is the necrotizing form of the disease) pancreatitis using simple and inexpensive parameters which are available everywhere. At present, a CT scan should be performed in those patients with alcohol etiology, those admitted to hospital early (time interval between the onset of symptoms and admission to hospital of less than 24 h, those presenting with rebound tenderness and/or guarding, a lipase >1,000 U/l, as well as a raised hematocrit and blood glucose. The evaluation, furthermore, shows that some parameters have a sufficiently high negative predictive value of >90%, which may render a contrast-enhanced CT scan unnecessary in the early stages, unless the patient fails to improve. These parameters include non-alcohol etiology, time interval between onset and admission to hospital longer than 24 h, no guarding or rebound tenderness on admission, low or normal hematocrit and nonelevated blood glucose. It is necessary to look further on simple low cost and more valid parameters on admission in order to reliably distinguish between necrotizing pancreatitis and interstitial pancreatitis.

[Acute pancreatitis]

While interstitial acute pancreatitis usually takes a benign course, necrotizing acute pancreatitis takes a severe course, mainly because of severe local and systemic complications. After a quick diagnosis it is necessary to rapidly assess a degree of severity of the disease and thus the prognosis. The clinical picture and the result of imaging procedures do not always correspond. The management basically includes to treat pain as well as to administer fluid, electrolyte, protein and calories. In addition, systemic treatment of complications such as shock or respiratory and renal insufficiency--if occurring--is necessary. In case of pancreatic necrosis, prophylactic administration of pancreas-penetrable antibiotics is recommended to avoid infection. In the severely ill with infected pancreatic necrosis, surgery is the treatment of choice. In approximately 10% of all patients with alcohol-induced pancreatitis, there is a gradual transition to chronic pancreatitis.

Value of contrast-enhanced computerized tomography in the early diagnosis and prognosis of acute pancreatitis. A prospective study of 202 patients

Two hundred two patients admitted with the clinical suspicion of acute pancreatitis underwent computerized tomography scanning within 36 hours of admission. The diagnostic value of the computerized tomography findings was excellent, with a sensitivity of 92 percent and a specificity of 100 percent. One hundred seventy-six patients with acute pancreatitis defined according to the overall clinical course were included in the prognostic study. The pancreatitis was fatal in 21 patients, severe in 47 patients, and mild in 108 patients. The computerized tomography findings were classified into the following three groups on the basis of the extent of phlegmonous extrapancreatic spread: Group I, no phlegmonous extrapancreatic spread (100 patients, none died); Group II, phlegmonous extrapancreatic spread in one or two areas (28 patients, mortality rate 4 percent); and Group III, phlegmonous extrapancreatic spread in three or more areas (48 patients, mortality rate 42 percent) (p less than 0.0001). The following three scores from prognostic clinical and laboratory data were also obtained: Score 1, zero or one positive sign (82 patients, none died); Score 2, two to four positive signs (54 patients, mortality rate 13 percent); Score 3, five or more positive signs (40 patients, mortality rate 35 percent) (p less than 0.001). The combination of computerized tomography findings and prognostic signs had the best predictive value. Patients in Group III, Score 3 (24 patients) or Group III, Score 2 (19 patients) had mortality rates of 58 percent and 32 percent, respectively, and complications developed in all of the survivors. In addition, all except two acute pancreatitis patients in whom pancreatic abscess developed were found in Group III (p less than 0.0001). Furthermore, for Group III patients, the prediction of death associated with abscesses was enhanced by the number of prognostic signs. The mortality rate increased from 17 percent for Score 2 patients to 81 percent for Score 3 patients (p = 0.0078). As a result of this study, we recommend early computerized tomography for all Score 2 and Score 3 patients, since it allows prompt recognition of patients at high risk for systemic and local complications. Adequate therapy can then be directed to the group of patients to whom it is best suited. Serial computerized tomographies should be reserved for those patients presenting with phlegmonous extrapancreatic spread.