Epidemiology and etiology of chronic pancreatitis in Brazil: a tale of two cities.

We observed 797 consecutive cases of chronic pancreatitis from 1963 to 1987 in the cities of Belo Horizonte and São Paulo. Alcoholism was the main etiological agent, responsible for 714 cases (89.6%). Chronic calcifying pancreatitis from different etiologies, alcohol, idiopathic, nutritional, and familial, was the most important form of chronic pancreatitis, with 786 cases (98.6%). Only three cases of chronic obstructive pancreatitis were diagnosed. Eight cases of chronic pancreatitis, anatomicopathologically studied, have not showed the typical pancreatic changes of either chronic calcifying pancreatitis or of obstructive pancreatitis and were impossible to classify according to the 1984 Marseilles' classification.