Background: Pancreatic duct stents are used for a variety of endoscopic pancreatic manipulations, and small surgical stents are used prophylactically to bridge pancreatic-enteric anastomoses. With increasing use of pancreatic stents, many complications have been recognized.
Objective: To determine the complications and outcomes of pancreatic stent migration.
Design: Case series from a retrospective review of all cases of upstream or proximally migrated pancreatic duct stents, placed either endoscopically or surgically, identified between 2000 and 2007.
Setting: Tertiary referral center.
Patients: This study involved 33 patients; 23 postendoscopic and 10 postsurgical stents.
Main outcome measurements: Retrieval rates, minor/major complications.
Results: Endoscopic stents had a successful retrieval rate of 78%. Most patients were asymptomatic. The most common procedure was balloon extraction (8 of 18; 44%). Nine patients required multiple procedures (3 patients, 2 attempts; 5 patients, 3 attempts; 1 patient, 4 attempts). Five stents could not be retrieved. Of these, 4 were associated with downstream stenosis. Four patients underwent surgery, and 1 patient was treated with observation. Complications included pancreatic duct disruption (1 of 23), stent fragmentation (1 of 23), and postprocedure pancreatitis (1 of 23). Surgically placed stents had a successful retrieval rate of 80%. Most surgical stents had migrated into the biliary tree (8 of 10). All of these patients were symptomatic with pain or fever. Two stents could not be retrieved; 1 of those patients underwent surgery.
Limitation: Retrospective study.
Conclusion: The majority of upstream-migrated stents can be endoscopically removed. Despite manipulation of the pancreatic duct, pancreatitis was infrequent. Surgically placed pancreatic stents migrate downstream and into the open biliary anastomosis and are associated with pain, cholangitis, or liver abscesses.