Preoperative ultrasonic of common bile duct stones and its importance to surgical management--result of a prospective controlled trial.

The biliary tract was examined by sonography in 192 nonselected surgical patients with clinically suspected gallbladder stone disease. This study was carried out to assess the potentiality of ultrasonic examination in the detection of common bile duct stones. All patients were operated on with sonographic monitoring during surgery. Common bile duct stones can be detected with high accuracy only in patients with an obstructive jaundice and a dilated common duct. In these, the sensitivity was found to be 70%, whereas that for the whole group of patients was as low as 28%. Accuracy in the ultrasonic detection of common bile duct stones is limited, and operative cholangiography seems to retain its position as the most reliable method of exploring common bile duct stones.