Endoscopically assisted minimally invasive surgery for gallstones.

BACKGROUND: We present a case report of Bouveret syndrome followed by a review of the recent literature regarding the management of this condition. Bouveret syndrome is a form of gastric outlet obstruction secondary to a gallstone which has eroded through the gallbladder into the duodenum. It is an uncommon variant of gallstone ileus. Endoscopic methods have been described to extract the stone from the duodenum.
METHODS: This is a case of an 85-year-old female patient who presented with a 1-week history of nausea, intermittent bilious vomiting and anorexia. Imaging confirmed the diagnosis of Bouveret syndrome caused by two large gallstones. Conventional endoscopic methods successfully extracted the impacted stones from the duodenum into the stomach but were unable to extract the stones from the stomach. A mini-transverse laparotomy and gastrotomy were performed to finally extract the stones.