Alcohol and acute pancreatitis. An experimental study in the rat.

The effect of chronic alcohol pretreatment and various pancreatobiliary secretions on the severity of experimental pancreatitis was studied in the rat. 95 rats were pretreated with ethanol (20% w/v, 1.1 ml/100 g body weight) five times weekly for 10 to 12 weeks by gastric intubation. 88 rats served as controls. Pancreatic lesions were produced by retograde injection of different pancreatobiliary secretions into the pancreatic ducts. The secretions were collected from both normal and chronically alcohol-fed rats, and each was used for induction of experimental pancreatitis in the control and alcohol pretreated rats. Bile obtained from normal rats was no more toxic to the pancreas than 0.9% saline solution, while bile obtained from the chronically alcohol-fed rats caused significantly more serious lesions to the pancreas than did normal rat bile. Bile-pancreatic juice (mixture of secretions at papilla of Vater) of normal and chronically alcohol-fed rats was as toxic as the bile of the alcohol-fed rats. Alcohol pretreatment had no significant effect on the severity of pancreatitis when control and alcohol-fed groups separately or the whole material according to pretreatment was examined. These results suggest that the metabolic effects of ethanol on the pancreas as such do not sensitize the pancreas to acute pancreatitis. An exogenous mechanism is required. The reflux of toxic alcoholic bile into the pancreas might act as an induction factor in acute alcohol pancreatitis.