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World J Radiol. May 28, 2016; 8(5): 518-529
Published online May 28, 2016. doi: 10.4329/wjr.v8.i5.518
Radiological interventions in malignant biliary obstruction
Kumble Seetharama Madhusudhan, Shivanand Gamanagatti, Deep Narayan Srivastava, Arun Kumar Gupta
Kumble Seetharama Madhusudhan, Shivanand Gamanagatti, Deep Narayan Srivastava, Arun Kumar Gupta, Department of Radiodiagnosis, All India Institute of Medical Sciences, New Delhi 110029, India
Author contributions: Madhusudhan KS and Gamanagatti S collected the data and wrote the paper; Srivastava DN and Gupta AK edited the paper.
Conflict-of-interest statement: The authors declare no conflicts of interest for this article.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article which was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Correspondence to: Shivanand Gamanagatti, MD, Additional Professor, Department of Radiodiagnosis, All India Institute of Medical Sciences, Ansari Nagar, New Delhi 110029, India. shiv223@gmail.com
Telephone: +91-11-26594567 Fax: +91-11-26588663
Received: September 8, 2015
Peer-review started: September 9, 2015
First decision: October 27, 2015
Revised: January 25, 2016
Accepted: March 7, 2016
Article in press: March 9, 2016
Published online: May 28, 2016
Processing time: 253 Days and 0.2 Hours
Abstract

Malignant biliary obstruction is commonly caused by gall bladder carcinoma, cholangiocarcinoma and metastatic nodes. Percutaneous interventions play an important role in managing these patients. Biliary drainage, which forms the major bulk of radiological interventions, can be palliative in inoperable patients or pre-operative to improve liver function prior to surgery. Other interventions include cholecystostomy and radiofrequency ablation. We present here the indications, contraindications, technique and complications of the radiological interventions performed in patients with malignant biliary obstruction.

Keywords: Biliary obstruction; Biliary malignancy; Biliary drainage; Cholecystostomy; Biliary interventions; Interventional radiology

Core tip: Malignant biliary obstruction is a common cause of jaundice and frequently needs percutaneous radiological interventions as a part of pre-operative or palliative treatment. Various techniques are available for biliary drainage and tumor palliation. The indications, technique, advantages and complications of each of the procedures are presented in this review.