Forty-six patients with primary sclerosing cholangitis: radiological bile duct changes in relationship to clinical course and concomitant inflammatory bowel disease.

The clinical features of primary sclerosing cholangitis were studied in 46 consecutive patients. Jaundice was the most common symptom (57%), followed by pruritus (28%), pain (24%), and fever (15%). Thirty-three per cent of the patients had no symptoms, merely laboratory changes. No significant relationship was observed between a numerical score of radiological bile duct changes at diagnosis and the clinical picture, or the clinical course during follow-up. If clinical deterioration occurred, this seemed to happen within the first eight years after the clinical presentation. Patients with only intra-hepatic bile duct changes (n = 10) did not differ clinically from those with extrahepatic changes as well. Forty-three out of 44 patients examined had inflammatory bowel disease, usually ulcerative colitis, with total colitis in 84%. Radiological bile duct changes had a significantly higher score in patients who had to be treated with a combination of sulfasalazine and steroids, suggesting a weak relationship between severity of bowel disease and bile duct disease.