There are stones in the gallbladder. They can block the bile ducts, cause biliary colic or pancreatitis, provoke the development of gallbladder cancer, or even lie in the bladder wall and fall out into the abdominal cavity.
If stones interfere with life or threaten with a tumor, then they are disposed of. Some gallbladders are removed with stones by surgeons, and some stones can be dissolved with the help of a gastroenterologist.
Conventional gastroenterologists do not always help with gallstones. The most beneficial for health are gastroenterologists who do not hesitate to use x-rays to diagnose gallstones.
The bottom line is that cholesterol stones are most often found in the gallbladder. This process is slow and creeps at a rate of 1 millimeter of stone per month. That is, the dissolution of a stone 1 centimeter in size can take a year.
The stone dissolves immediately both outside and inside. Therefore, until the last moment, he looks like a stone. Then the thin skeleton of the dissolved stone falls apart and turns into sand, which should naturally pass into the intestines with bile. Provided that the gallbladder, after adventures with stones, is still able to spit something out of itself effectively.
That is, the task of the gastroenterologist is to guess that the stone is cholesterol, that it has not ossified and is not covered with a calcium shell, and also to make sure that the gallbladder is alive and still moving.
ultrasound
I would like to believe that ultrasound can determine all this, but in fact it turns out to be very unreliable. Small stones can go unnoticed or stick together in one big pile, disguised as a giant stone.
x-ray
Here they use a CT scan, and a regular X-ray, and an X-ray with contrast, so that you can see how the contrast fills the gallbladder and pours out of it.
The tomogram will show a hard shell and calculate the density of the stone in special units, which will guide the gastroenterologist.
It is also important to determine the buoyancy of the stone. If the stone has surfaced inside the gallbladder, then it is rather cholesterol. Well it is clear. Cholesterol is fat, and it floats in water.
I was also shown a gallbladder scan with a radioactive isotope. But, in my opinion, they do it more likely with other diseases of the gallbladder.
More shortly, without the gastroenterologist you will not understand.
