Algorithm of Management of a Patient with Acute Cholestatic Hepatitis

Abstract

Laparoscopic cholecystectomy (LC) is one of the commonest elective laparoscopic procedures performed. In the United Kingdom, these procedures are performed widely through the National Health Service. Whilst a few years ago, patients remained in the hospital for 1 or 2 days after uncomplicated LC, increasingly this procedure is being performed on an outpatient basis. Improved primary care support and increasing financial pressures have also diminished the postoperative follow-up of these patients by the operating surgeon. In essence, the operating surgeon is no longer involved in the postdischarge care and follow-up of patients undergoing LC.Though major complications after LC are well recognized, data about the process of patients' short-term recovery after hospital discharge, perceptions of well being, and the burden of postoperative care required in the community are not documented. Knowledge of this unobserved recovery phase is not only vital to organizing a community care package and improving service delivery and patient satisfaction, but also is very relevant feedback, which the operating surgeon misses in today's world.We hence performed this study with an aim to follow up patients closely after uncomplicated LC to document the postoperative symptoms, assess their perceptions regarding return to preoperative routine and estimate the postoperative care they required from the community health services.