In the current issue of Endoscopy International Open, Ahmed, et al. discuss trends for utilization of endoscopic retrograde cholangio-pancreatography in the United States over the years 2002 to 2013 [1]. Not surprising has been a shift from diagnostic to therapeutic ERCP and an accompanying fall in total procedures in the years between 2011 and 2013. What this manuscript fails to define, however, is that the vast majority of ERCPs in the United States have morphed from inpatient to outpatient procedures. As such, the 37,400 procedures recorded and reported in the current paper annually are dwarfed by the total ERCPs recorded annually in the United States (estimated > 450,000) [2].
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Richard A. Kozarek (2017) studied this question.
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