A Medical Treatment for Gallstones?

Abstract

Four years ago in these pages the question was asked "Why can't gallstones make the first division in the research league?" Since that time considerable fundamental progress has been made, especially in the area of bile-salt metabolism, and the report by Danzinger and his co-workers in this issue of the Journal indicates that gallstones have finally made it! The investigators from the Mayo Clinic have demonstrated that chenodeoxycholic acid, when given to patients with cholesterol gallstones, can cause the dissolution of stones in situ. In the United States over 15 million people have cholesterol gallstones, of which over 1/3 are . . .