Treatment of biliary stones using extracorporeal shock waves (ESWL).

The use of extracorporeal shock waves (ESWL) for the treatment of biliary stones was introduced into medicine in 1985. Since then several thousand patients had been treated throughout the world. Treatment is reasonably safe, and the best candidates are patients with solitary radiolucent stones in an opacifying gallbladder and those with bile duct stones primarily unamenable to endoscopic measures.