Abstract
Case 1 was a 78-year-old woman who had undergone open cholecystectomy 10 years earlier for gallstone-associated cholecystitis ; she visited our hospital complaining of abdominal pain. We diagnosed a retained gallbladder stone with cholecystitis, and treated her by laparoscopic surgery. The operation was difficult because of much intraperitoneal fat and severe adhesions ; we removed the retained gallbladder stone and closed the cystic duct with a stapler. Case 2 was a 55-year-old man. He presented to our hospital complaining of abdominal pain. A gallstone was found incarcerated in the neck of the gallbladder. The gallstone severely compressed the common bile duct, resulting in the so-called Mirizzi syndrome. We performed emergency laparoscopic surgery. We resected the gallbladder at the gallbladder neck in order to avoid complications. The gallstone was left intentionally. After a 3-month symptom-free interval, the patient presented with symptoms of cholecystitis because of the retained gallbladder stone. Therefore, we performed repeat laparoscopic surgery. The retained gallbladder stone was removed, and we closed the gallbladder neck with sutures. Both the patients were discharged relatively early after the reoperation without complications. There was no recurrence of the condition after the operation. Subtotal cholecystectomy for acute cholecystitis had been performed in both cases in order to avoid complications. However, both developed cholecystitis associated with the retained gallbladder stone. We performed laparoscopic surgery for both and achieved satisfactory results.
