Abstract
During intravariceal sclerotherapy of esophageal varices with polidocanol in 32 patients
with portal hypertension due to liver cirrhosis of various etiologies, endosonographic
assessment of both esophageal and gastric intramural vessels was carried out in order
to evaluate the usefulness of endosonography in the follow-up of the variceal status.
In all cases endosonography demonstrated esophageal and gastric varices; in contrast,
only five cases of gastric varices could be demonstrated by endoscopy. Furthermore,
different stages of variceal obliteration following sclerotherapy could be demonstrated
by means of endosonography, and it was possible to identify incomplete obliteration
in about one-third of the patients in whom inadequate sclerotherapy was suspected
endoscopically. In addition, the status of gastric varices during sclerotherapy was
demonstrated by means of endosonography. Only in cases of adequate sclerotherapy of
esophageal varices, as assessed by both endoscopic and endosonographic criteria, were
gastric varices plugged. On the basis of these findings endosonography would appear
to be a useful technique for the diagnosis and follow-up of esophageal and gastric
varices during intravariceal sclerotherapy.
