• Journal of the Korean Society of Radiology
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• v.82 no.2
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• pp.298-314
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• 2021

Owing to the anatomic complexity of the hepatic hilum, it has been considered difficult to diagnose and treat peri-hilar cholangiocarcinoma. Currently, imaging studies, including contrast-enhanced CT and MRI, play a crucial role in the detection, characterization, staging, and resectability assessment of peri-hilar cholangiocarcinoma. In this review, the classification of perihilar cholangiocarcinoma and proposed imaging protocol for the evaluation will be discussed. The typical imaging finding of peri-hilar cholangiocarcinoma, evaluation of longitudinal tumor extent, adjacent vascular invasion, and distant metastasis will also be mentioned. Finally, traditional concepts and recent updates for the resectability assessment of peri-hilar cholangiocarcinoma will be introduced.

• Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention
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• v.15 no.14
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• pp.5617-5620
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• 2014

Objective: To evaluate the prognosis of different ways of drainage for patients with obstructive jaundice caused by hilar cholangiocarcinoma. Materials and Methods: During the period of January 2006- March 2012, percutaneous transhepatic catheter drainage (PTCD)/ percutaneous transhepatic biliary stenting (PTBS) were performed for 89 patients. According to percutaneous transhepatic cholangiography (PTC), external drainage was selected if the region of obstruction could not be passed by guide wire or a metallic stent was inserted if it could. External drainage was the first choice if infection was diagnosed before the procedure, and a metallic stent was inserted in one week after the infection was under control. Selection by new infections, the degree of bilirubin decrease, the change of ALT, the time of recurrence of obstruction, and the survival time of patients as the parameters was conducted to evaluate the methods of different interventional treatments regarding prognosis of patients with hilar obstruction caused by hilar cholangiocarcinoma. Results: PTCD was conducted in 6 patients and PTBS in 7 (p<0.05). Reduction of bilirubin levels and ALT levels was obvious after the procedures (p<0.05). The average survival time with PTCD was 161 days and with PTBS was 243 days (p<0.05). Conclusions: With both drainage procedures for obstructive jaundice caused by hilar cholangiocarcinoma improvement in liver function was obvious. PTBS was found to be better than PTCD for prolonging the patient survival.

• Parasites, Hosts and Diseases
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• v.57 no.5
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• pp.517-520
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• 2019

Echinococcosis is a disease caused by the Echinococcus species that parasitizes in humans. Alveolar echinococcosis (AE) which is caused by Echinococcus multilocularis is harmful to humans. AE mainly occurs in the liver and can be transferred to retroperitoneal lymph nodes, lung, brain, bone, spleen and other organs through lymphatic and blood vessels. Cholangiocarcinoma can occur in of the intrahepatic and extrahepatic bile ducts and is more common in the hilar. We reported a case of hilar bile duct alveolar echinococcosis which was originally misdiagnosed an cholangiocarcinoma.

• Annals of Hepato-Biliary-Pancreatic Surgery
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• v.27 no.3
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• pp.227-240
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• 2023

Hilar cholangiocarcinomas are highly aggressive malignancies. They are usually at an advanced stage at initial presentation. Surgical resection with negative margins is the standard of management. It provides the only chance of cure. Liver transplantation has increased the number of 'curative' procedures for cases previously considered to be unresectable. Meticulous and thorough preoperative planning is required to prevent fatal post-operative complications. Extended resection procedures, including hepatic trisectionectomy for Bismuth type IV tumors, hepatopancreaticoduodenectomy for tumors with extensive longitudinal spread, and combined vascular resection with reconstruction for tumors involving hepatic vascular structures, are challenging procedures with surgical indications expanded. Liver transplantation after the standardization of a neoadjuvant protocol described by the Mayo Clinic has increased the number of patients who can undergo operation.

• Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention
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• v.14 no.1
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• pp.529-532
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• 2013

Cholangiocarcinoma, though very rare in Western countries, is one of the commonest liver malignancies in Southeast Asia, especially in Thailand. More than half of the patients present with advanced stage disease. Given the poor treatment outcomes of adjuvant therapeutic options, many patients undergo only biliary drainage for palliative treatment. Clinical characteristics and treatment outcomes after biliary stenting were here analyzed for a total of 224 uresectable cholangiocarcinoma cases, 58.9% in men. The mean age was 61.5 years. Hilar involvement was the most common location. The patients underwent biliary drainage using plastic and metallic stents equally, early stent occlusion being encountered in 21.4% and 10.7%, respectively. The median survival time was 4.93 months for patients who received plastic and 5.87 months for patients who received metallic stents.

• Clinical Endoscopy
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• v.56 no.2
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• pp.155-163
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• 2023

Malignant hilar biliary obstruction (MHO), an aggressive perihilar biliary obstruction caused by cholangiocarcinoma, gallbladder cancer, or other metastatic malignancies, has a poor prognosis. Surgical resection is the only curative treatment for biliary malignancies. However, the majority of patients with MHO cannot undergo surgery on presentation because of an advanced inoperable state or a poor performance state due to old age or comorbid diseases. Therefore, palliative biliary drainage is mandatory to improve symptomatic jaundice and the quality of life. Among the drainage methods, endoscopic biliary drainage is the current standard for palliation of unresectable advanced MHO. In addition, combined with endoscopic drainage, additional local ablation therapies, such as photodynamic therapy or radiofrequency ablation (RFA), have been introduced to prolong stent patency and survival. Currently, RFA is commonly used as palliative therapy, even for advanced MHO. This literature review summarizes recent studies on RFA for advanced MHO.

• Clinical Endoscopy
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• v.56 no.2
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• pp.135-142
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• 2023

Endoscopic biliary drainage strategies for managing unresectable malignant hilar biliary obstruction differ in terms of stent type, drainage area, and deployment method. However, the optimal endoscopic drainage strategy remains unclear. Uncovered self-expandable metal stents (SEMS) are the preferred type because of their higher functional success rate, longer time to recurrent biliary obstruction (RBO), and fewer cases of reintervention than plastic stents (PS). Other PS subtypes and covered SEMS, which feature a longer time to RBO than PS, can be removed during reintervention for RBO. Bilateral SEMS placement is associated with a longer time to RBO and a longer survival time than unilateral SEMS placement. Unilateral drainage is acceptable if a drainage volume of greater than 50% of the total liver volume can be achieved. In terms of deployment method, no differences were observed in clinical outcomes between side-by-side (SBS) and stent-in-stent deployment. Simultaneous SBS boasts a shorter procedure time and higher technical success rate than sequential SBS. This review of previous studies aimed to clarify the optimal endoscopic biliary drainage strategy for unresectable malignant hilar biliary obstruction.

• Journal of Yeungnam Medical Science
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• v.22 no.2
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• pp.211-220
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• 2005

Background: The purpose of this study was to determine the effectiveness of a percutaneously placed self-expanding metallic stent for the relief of biliary obstruction in patients with hilar cholangiocarcinoma. Materials and Methods: From November 2001 to December 2004, 48 patients with hilar cholangiocarcinoma were prospectively studied. After percutaneous placement of bilateral selfexpanding, uncovered metallic stents, follow-up evaluation was carried out until July 2005. Results: There were 4 cases of Bismuth type II, 21 cases of Bismuth type IIIa, 8 cases of Bismuth type IIIb and 15 cases of Bismuth type IV. Stent placement was technically successful in all patients. All patients had satisfactory biliary drainage, resulting in one week drainage rate of 72.8% and final drainage rate of 91.1%. There were 12 cases (21.3%) of abdominal pain requiring analgesics and 1 case (7.1%) of cholangitis; both were successfully managed with conservative treatments. Late complications occurred in four patient (8.3%), including two patients with cholangitis, one patient with liver abscess, and one patient with biloma; all were appropriately managed by percutaneous drainage. The average length and median durations of stent patency and median survival time were 303 days (range, 60~815) and 338 days (range, 60~1175), respectively. Conclusion: Placement of a percutaneous metallic stent is an effective and safe method for palliation of patients with hilar cholangiocarcinoma.

• Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention
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• v.13 no.11
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• pp.5381-5384
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• 2012

Background and Aim: Cholangiocarcinoma (CCA) is an uncommon malignancy of the bile duct, occurring in nearly 2 out of 100,000 people. It is a type of adenocarcinoma that originates in the mucous glands of the epithelium, or surface layers of the bile ducts. The aim of this study was to evaluate the clinical features, diagnostic results and factors associated with survival, morbidity and mortalityof cholangiocarcinoma cases in Iranian patients. Method: In this retrospective study the hospital medical records of 283 patients with a primary or final diagnosis of cholangiocarcinoma who had been admitted to gastroenterology ward of our hospital from 2004 to 2011 were retrospectively reviewed. Results: 283 patients (180 male, 63%, and 103 female, 38.6%) with a mean age of $59.7{\pm}14.4$ years were studied. The most frequent symptoms were painless jaundice (190, 66.9%), abdominal pain (77, 27%), pruritus 133 (46.8%) and weight loss (169, 59.5%). The most frequent associated risk factors and diseases were as follows: gallstones (72, 25.4%), diabetes (70, 24.6%), HBV infection (52 (18.3%), HCV infection 43 (15%), primary sclerosing cholangitis (16, 5.6%) and smoking (120, 42.3%). The most frequent type of cholangiocarcinoma in ERCP and MRCP was hilar. The mean survival time was $7.42{\pm}5.76$ months. Conclusion: The mean survival time in our study was lower than one year. Moreover the most frequent risk factors and associated diseases were smoking, gallstones and diabetes. Painless jaundice, abdominal pain and weight loss were the most clinical features related to cholangiocarcinoma. Additionally survival time did not correlate with risk factors, associated diseases and clinical presentations, but was linked to biliary metallic stenting and surgery.

• The Korean Journal of Medicine
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• v.99 no.1
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• pp.4-10
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• 2024

Malignant hilar biliary obstruction (MHO), an aggressive type of perihilar biliary obstruction caused by cholangiocarcinoma, gallbladder cancer, or other metastatic malignancies, has a poor prognosis. Surgical resection is the only curative treatment for biliary malignancies. However, most patients with MHO cannot undergo surgery upon presentation because of their advanced inoperable state or poor performance resulting from old age or comorbid diseases. Therefore, palliative biliary drainage is required to improve symptomatic jaundice and quality of life. Preoperative biliary drainage is controversial in resectable cases of MHO. Preoperative biliary drainage should be considered according to specific selection criteria. Palliative drainage is currently the mainstay of symptomatic treatment. Compared with percutaneous access, primary endoscopic palliation using plastic or metal stents has recently shown higher technical feasibility and clinical success without increasing the frequency of adverse events, even in high-degree MHO. However, the use of stents still has numerous limitations, including challenges in determining the optimal type of stent, number of stents, deployment method, and additional local therapies. Therefore, this report presents the current optimal endoscopic drainage status for MHO based on recent guidelines and published literature.