Editorial
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World J Gastroenterol. Aug 21, 2013; 19(31): 5029-5034
Published online Aug 21, 2013. doi: 10.3748/wjg.v19.i31.5029
Ursodeoxycholic acid therapy in gallbladder disease, a story not yet completed
Michele Pier Luca Guarino, Silvia Cocca, Annamaria Altomare, Sara Emerenziani, Michele Cicala
Michele Pier Luca Guarino, Silvia Cocca, Annamaria Altomare, Sara Emerenziani, Michele Cicala, Department of Digestive Disease, Campus Bio Medico University, 00128 Rome, Italy
Author contributions: All the authors contributed equally to the paper, drafting the article and revising it critically for important intellectual content, with a substantial contribution to conception and design the article, and approving the final version to be published.
Correspondence to: Michele Pier Luca Guarino, MD, Department of Digestive Disease, Campus Bio Medico University, Via Alvaro del Portillo 200, 00128 Rome, Italy. m.cicala@unicampus.it
Telephone: +39-6-22541560 Fax: +39-6-22541520
Received: June 6, 2013
Revised: July 12, 2013
Accepted: July 18, 2013
Published online: August 21, 2013
Processing time: 73 Days and 20.2 Hours
Core Tip

Core tip: Ursodeoxycholic acid can be considered one of the less expensive, best tested and safest of the drugs currently available. This editorial is aimed to provide a brief review of the principal non-invasive non-surgical medical treatments for cholesterol gallstones. Based on the literature and on our experimental and clinical works we try to summarize the recent developments in ursodeoxycholic acid use, current indications for its use and the more recent advances in understanding its effects in terms of an anti-inflammatory drug. For these reasons, the story would not appear to end herewith but deserves further attention and investigation.