BACKGROUND & AIM:

Patients with biliary pancreatitis are suggested to undergo cholecystectomy to prevent the recurrence of pancreatitis. However, it remains controversial whether cholecystectomy is associated with reduced risks of pancreatitis and diabetes in patients with cholelithiasis and no history of pancreatitis.

METHODS:

From Taiwan's National Health Insurance Research Database, we identified the following cohorts and analyzed the long-term risks of pancreatitis and diabetes in each cohort: 1) cholecystectomy cohort: cholelithiasis patients who had no history of pancreatitis and diabetes and underwent cholecystectomy; and 2) comparison cohort: cholelithiasis patients who had no history of pancreatitis and diabetes and did not undergo cholecystectomy.

RESULTS:

The cholecystectomy group and the comparison group had similar distributions of age, sex, and comorbidities, except for hyperlipidemia. The proportion of patients in the cholecystectomy group who underwent endoscopic cholangiographic procedures was higher than that in the comparison group. Cholecystectomy was associated with a reduced risk of pancreatitis (adjusted hazard ratio [HR], 0.49; 95% confidence interval [CI], 0.36-0.68). Age-specific analyses showed that pancreatitis risk was decreased in patients younger than 50 and older than 65years. Both men and women exhibited reduced risks of pancreatitis after cholecystectomy. However, cholecystectomy was not associated with changes in the risk for diabetes.

CONCLUSION:

Cholecystectomy for cholelithiasis is associated with a reduced risk of pancreatitis, but not of diabetes, in patients without previous history of pancreatitis and diabetes.