Half a Million Cholecystectomies — and ERCP Use Still Rising
Mullens and colleagues analyzed 516,372 inpatient minimally invasive cholecystectomies in Medicare beneficiaries from 2011 to 2021. Cholecystectomy itself became meaningfully safer: risk-adjusted overall complications fell from 21.5% to 16.5% and serious complications from 12.3% to 7.0%, despite rising patient complexity. Yet over the same decade, one-year post-cholecystectomy ERCP use climbed roughly 40% (11.2% to 15.3%) and postoperative percutaneous drainage more than doubled. The accompanying editorial, “From Safer Cholecystectomy to Smarter Bile Duct Management,” draws the conclusion the data invite: the field’s next quality frontier is a surgery-first approach to the bile duct, applied at the index operation.”
Citation
Mullens CL, Sinamo JK, Hallway A, et al. Contemporary outcomes of cholecystectomy. JAMA Surg. 2026;161(4):398-405. doi:10.1001/jamasurg.2025.6865
