Acute Pancreatitis

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REVIEW URRENT C OPINION

Acute pancreatitis Jan J. De Waele

Purpose of review To review the changing insights in the pathophysiology and management of acute pancreatitis. Recent findings The outdated 1992 Atlanta classification has been replaced by two new classifications, both of which acknowledge the role of organ dysfunction in determining the outcome of acute pancreatitis, and both of which have introduced a new category of ‘moderate’ pancreatitis. The new classifications will allow fewer patients to be classified as severe, which better reflects the risk of dying of the disease. Intra-abdominal hypertension has emerged as a relevant issue, and strategies to lower intra-abdominal pressure may often be required. Antibiotic prophylaxis has been discontinued for some time, but aggressive fluid resuscitation is also being questioned, and the role of surgery is further reduced as percutaneous drainage of collections has shown to reduce the need for more surgical interventions. If needed, surgery should be as conservative as possible, with minimally invasive strategies preferable. Newer techniques such as endoscopic transgastric drainage are being developed, but their exact role has yet to be defined. Summary Management of severe acute pancreatitis is changing fundamentally. ‘Less is more’ is the new paradigm in acute pancreatitis – less antibiotics, less fluids, less surgery, which should eventually lead to less morbidity and mortality. Keywords acute pancreatitis, fluid resuscitation, intra-abdominal hypertension, organ failure, pancreatic necrosis

INTRODUCTION Acute pancreatitis is an acute inflammation of the pancreas that is self-limiting in most cases, and only a minority of patients, estimated around 15%, develops a more serious form of the disease. Despite improvements in our knowledge of the disease and critical care support, severe acute pancreatitis still carries a considerable mortality rate. In recent years, much of what was once standard therapy has become obsolete, as research found several treatment strategies such as aggressive fluid resuscitation, prophylactic antibiotics and early debridement for patients who do not improve, to be associated with worse rather than improved outcome. In this review, we will discuss the proposed new classification of acute pancreatitis and the above-mentioned changes in the management of these severely ill patients.

ACUTE PANCREATITIS: DESCRIPTION AND CLASSIFICATION Classification of acute pancreatitis is essential when studying the disease, in order to compare studies as well as for appropriate patient selection for

inclusion in these clinical studies. In 1992, a panel of experts convened in Atlanta, which resulted in the so-called Atlanta criteria that have been used in clinical research. Although these may have been valid at the time of development, the criteria received a lot of criticism in recent years. The 1992 criteria discriminated mild and severe pancreatitis based on local and systemic criteria, but the definitions used were no longer up to date, and in recent years, several publications used additional criteria to define severe acute pancreatitis. Notably, the definitions used to describe organ dysfunction were outdated and it was considered that the definitions did no longer reflect current knowledge. This led two groups of experts to independently Ghent University Hospital, Department of Critical Care Medicine, Ghent, Belgium Correspondence to Jan J. De Waele, MD, PhD, Department of Critical Care Medicine, Ghent University Hospital, De Pintelaan 185, 9000 Gent, Belgium. Tel: +32 93 32 62 19; fax: +32 93 32 49 95; e-mail: Jan.DeWaele@UGent.be Curr Opin Crit Care 2014, 20:189–195 DOI:10.1097/MCC.0000000000000068

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Copyright © Lippincott Williams & Wilkins. Unauthorized reproduction of this article is prohibited.


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