Isolated vascularized gastric tube biliary enteric drainage: a paediatric case series experience

Background Despite the enormous surgical advancements in the last century, access to the biliary system is lost when a Roux-en-Y (RY) biliary drainage procedure is performed. Attempts have been made to overcome this inconvenient sequel using variations in the RY anastomosis, small bowel grafts and vascular grafts. These have been predominantly unsuccessful. An isolated vascularized gastric tube (IVGT) graft has been reported in the literature, which was successfully used for adult patients with common bile duct injuries. We have adopted the technique of using an IVGT graft for bile duct reconstruction in the paediatric patients at our institution. We reviewed our experience at our institution between January 2015 and October 2019. This was a retrospective review of all paediatric patients undergoing an IVGT graft procedure for biliary tract anatomical obstruction in the past 5 years. We looked at the indications for surgery, the demographic profile of the patients and outcomes following surgery and outlined the surgical technique used. Results IVGT bile duct reconstruction was performed on eight patients. Patients ranged from 2 months to 7 years, and there was an equal number of males and females. The diagnosis was made on clinical suspicion and confirmed with ultrasound (U/S) and magnetic resonance cholangiopancreatography (MRCP). There was an 87.5% resolution of biliary obstruction, and two patients who had bile leaks postoperatively were managed conservatively. Unfortunately, one patient died in the early postoperative period from sepsis due to pneumonia. Follow-up was for a minimum of 6 months and up to 5 years. Conclusion IVGT biliary enteric drainage is a safe, reproducible procedure that allows access to the biliary tree if required in the future. Thus, this procedure serves as an alternative, especially in limited-resource areas where interventional radiology is not available for future interventions.

Bile duct reconstruction in choledochal malformations in children

Introduction. Currently, there is ongoing discussion regarding the method of biliary tract reconstruction in children with choledochal malformations (CM).Purpose. To make a comparative analysis of the techniques applied in bile duct reconstruction in children with CM.Material and methods. For 10 years we have admitted 99 patients with CM. 84 children with CM were operated on from January 2010 to May 2020. Group 1 - patients who had Roux-en-Y hepaticojejunostomy (RYHJ, n = 68, 81%); Group 2 - patients who had hepaticoduodenostomy (HD, n = 16, 19%). The surgical access varied depending on the biliodigestive anastomosis technique. It was mini-laparotomy and laparoscopy. Surgical time, short-term and long-term postoperative outcomes were analyzed.Results. Groups were comparable in gender, age, clinical manifestations, CM complications before surgery, accompanied comorbidity (p > 0.05). It was found that CM types differ depending on the child’s age when the diagnosis was established ( p = 0.0493, Kruskal- Wallis test); there was also a statistically significant difference in the pair between CM 1C and CM 1F (p = 0.0164, paired post-test). It means that children with CM 1F were older, median age 49 months (Q1-Q3: 12-86 months), than children with CM 1C, median age 14 months (Q1-Q3: 5-30 months). In HD group, severe postoperative pancreatitis, which was not controlled with conservative therapy, developed more often (n = 2) (p <0.05) and required a number of repeated surgeries including re-hepatico and hepaticojejunostomoses, thus prolonging the length of stay in ICU and increasing much the number of bed days.Conclusion. In our study, RYHJ technique has some advantages over HD one. Therefore, at present we can recommend it as a basic one.