Sitemap

ERCP

Endoscopic retrograde cholangiopancreatography, or ERCP, is a specialized technique used to study the ducts or "drainage tubes" of the gallbladder, pancreas and liver

During the procedure an endoscope (a thin, flexible tube) will be passed through your mouth, past the oesophagus and stomach into the first part of the small intestine. A small plastic tube will then be placed through the instrument and into the bile duct and/or the pancreatic duct and X-ray dye injected in order to obtain a picture of these ducts.

Generally, you should take all your regular medications with a sip of water, even on the morning of the procedure. However, if you are taking blood-thinning medications (such as aspirin, persantin, warfarin or Plavix or Iscover), your doctor will need to discuss whether these should still be taken in the week before the procedure. Let your doctor know about any allergies you have to medications, iodine or intravenous contrast material. If you are diabetic your doctor will need to make special arrangements to ensure that your blood sugar is managed well around the time of the procedure. X-rays are used as part of the procedure. Therefore it is essential to tell your doctor if you could be pregnant.

Facts About ERCP
First Edition 2007

Contents

• What is ERCP?
• What preparation is required?
• What can I expect during ERCP?
• What are risks of ERCP?
• What can I expect after ERCP?

Download

Facts About ERCP is now available as an A4 size pdf file.
ERCP (Adobe Acrobat PDF 132KB)

Arabic
PDF 352KB

Chinese
PDF 508KB

Croatian
PDF 112KB

Greek
PDF 192KB

Italian
PDF 184KB

Serbian
PDF 120KB

Vietnamese
PDF 548KB