[Treatment of hemobilia after percutaneous transhepatic cholangiography and drainage (PTCD)].

PTCD was performed in 206 of our patients during the past 6 years and 7 months. Of the 206, hemobilia occurred in 14 patients (6.8%). The hemorrhage was completely stopped by irrigation of the bile duct in 3 patients, compression with a larger catheter in 7 patients, and transcatheter anterior embolization (TAE) in 4 patients. TAE was performed on the patients whose hemobilia could not controlled by the compression with a larger catheter. In TAE, either a steel coil or a sponge was used as an embolus. Rebleeding occurred in one patients for whom the right hepatic artery was chosen as a embolization site. Therefore, it was decided that the embolization was going to be done in all the hepatic arteries when the blood stream in the portal vein and preserved functions of the liver of the subjected patients including the one with rebleeding were fully normal. A complete control of the hemorrhage was obtained in all patients. The PTCD root caused hemobilia was removed after TAE in considering the possibility of rebleeding from the root, and a new PTCD root was made.