Changing Therapy for Gallstone Disease

Almost two decades have passed since Danziger and his coworkers at the Mayo Clinic reported that the primary bile acid chenodeoxycholic acid could dissolve cholesterol gallstones in humans when given orally for six months.1 After the accumulation of additional experience, a large, multicenter, randomized trial — the National Cooperative Gallstone Study —was conducted in the United States to determine the efficacy and safety of this agent as a clinical treatment for gallstones. The results, published in 1981, verified the claim that chenodeoxycholic acid (now known as chenodiol) could eliminate gallstones in selected patients, but even though therapy was restricted to . . .