All of the cancer cannot be removed in an operation. The cancer may have spread to nearby organs and lymph nodes or to other parts of the body. It may come back in the bile duct or in another part of the body. There are treatments for all patients with extrahepatic bile duct cancer. Other treatments for extrahepatic bile duct cancer are being studied in clinical trials.
Surgery is a common treatment of extrahepatic bile duct cancer.
If the cancer is small and is only in the bile duct, a doctor may remove the whole bile duct and make a new duct by connecting the duct openings in the liver to the intestine. The doctor will also remove lymph nodes and look at them under the microscope to see if they contain cancer. If the cancer has spread outside the bile duct, a surgeon may remove the bile duct and the tissues around it. If the cancer has spread and it cannot be removed, the doctor may do surgery to relieve symptoms. During this operation, the doctor will cut the gallbladder or bile duct and sew it to the small intestine.