Abstract

The correlation of metaplasia to dysplasia and carcinoma in the gallbladder has attracted the attention of many investigators. We mapped and examined a total of 263 cholecystectomized gallbladders to analyze the mucosal changes in the carcinogenesis of the gallbladder. Stones were present in 59.7%, hyperplasia in 28.5%, metaplasia in 55.5% (gastric 37.6%, intestinal 17.9%), dysplasia in 17.1% (low grade 9.1%, high grade 8%) and carcinoma in 7.6%. Metaplasia was more frequently identified in the stone-positive group (62.4%) than in the stone-negative group (45.3%) (P<0.05). Especially, the incidence of intestinal metaplasia was significantly higher in the stone-positive group. Dysplasia and carcinoma were more frequent in the metaplasia-positive group (dysplasia 26.7%, carcinoma 11%) than in the metaplasia-negative group (dysplasia 5.1%, carcinoma 3.4%) (P<0.05). Their incidences were significantly higher in the intestinal metaplasia than in the gastric metaplasia. Forty four percent of the dysplasia-positive cases were associated with carcinoma in the adjacent mucosa but carcinoma was absent in the dysplasia-negative cases. Hyperplasia did not reveal any significant correlation with metaplasia, dysplasia and carcinoma. These results suggest that gallstone is causally related to the metaplasia in the gallbladder and the metaplasia-dysplasia- carcinoma sequence exists in the gallbladder.

• Keywords: Gallbladder;Hyperplasia;Metaplasia;Dysplasia;Carcinoma