Right shoulder pain accompanied by flatulent dyspepsia is considered to be the best indicator. Once the presence of gallstones is confirmed the usual procedure is to schedule surgical removal of the gallbladder. More than 600,000 cholecystectomies are performed in this country every year despite overwhelming evidence that most are not necessary. Repeated warnings have been printed in medical journals against this practice, but to no avail. Having just completed a three-part series on lowering cholesterol levels in this column, I thought now might be a good time to share some pertinent information based on clinical studies.
Gallstones are extremely common .
Their occurrence in women is roughly double their occurrence in men. Gallstones usually do not cause symptoms . This is an incredibly important statistic for the chiropractic profession that I will discuss later. Patients with gallstones who are asymptomatic are likely to remain so . Because the use of abdominal ultrasound is increasing, more gallstones are being detected incidentally.