Progression from acute to chronic pancreatitis: a physician's view.

Whether or not AP may progress to the chronic form is controversial. Equally debatable is whether AP caused by alcohol abuse develops in a chronically diseased gland or in a normal pancreas. As for the state of the gland, several postmortem studies have shown that AP may occur after acute alcohol abuse in the normal pancreas. As for progression from acute to chronic pancreatitis, many experimental studies have demonstrated signs of the chronic from of the disease in animals, but these signs were reversible. Some clinical studies have shown that alcohol-induced pancreatitis may progress to chronic pancreatitis. There are, however, presently no predictive parameters indicating when such a progression does or does not occur.