LAPAROSCOPIC CHOLECYSTECTOMY - 563 CASES AT A COMMUNITY TEACHING HOSPITAL AND A REVIEW OF 12,201 CASES IN THE LITERATURE

Eleven surgeons attempted laparoscopic cholecystectomy in 563 patients over a 14-month period. Of these 563, 536 (95.3%) were performed succ essfully; the remaining patients required conversion to laparotomy, bu t only five because of complications. There were no mortalities associ ated with the procedure. Thirty-nine patients had complications, 14 su rgical and related to the procedure itself. Weight was not considered a contraindication. The preoperative diagnosis in 83.6% patients was c hronic cholecystitis, and in the remainder (16.4%) it was acute cholec ystitis. Mean operative time was 86.4 min, and mean hospital stay for uncomplicated successful laparoscopic cholecystectomy was 1.9 days. An extensive review of the literature reveals an additional 9,792 laparo scopic cholecystectomies performed at the time of the writing of this paper. Our results compare favorably to these. A discussion of histori cal aspects of the procedure, contraindications to laparoscopic cholec ystectomy, and the merits of selective intraoperative cholangiography are also presented.