Pancreaticoduodenectomy for Chronic Relapsing Pancreatitis

Abstract

Although von Mering and Minkowski were successful in removing the pancreas from the dog in 1889, it was almost 50 years before a similar procedure was accomplished in man. In 1935 Whipple¹⁶performed the first subtotal pancreaticoduodenectomy, and in 1944 Priestley¹²performed the first successful total pancreatectomy. During the two decades since Whipple's operation was originally described, pancreatectomy has been utilized with increasing frequency in the treatment of an array of benign and malignant diseases. The incidence of unsatisfactory results that are obtained in the treatment of chronic relapsing pancreatitis with indirect surgical procedures has stimulated interest in the treatment of this disease by more direct operative techniques, including resection of the pancreas.²A similar dissatisfaction with the results obtained by less radical but more conventional methods of treatment also prompted us to evaluate pancreaticoduodenectomy in selected cases that are characterized by far-advanced architectural changes of the