Laparoscopic Double Cholecystectomy in a Pediatric Patient for Gallbladder Duplication

Abstract

Gall bladder duplication is a rare congenital anomaly that can be identified clinically during the workup for gall bladder-related symptoms. This anatomic variation can complicate surgery, and yet there are few published reports of this variant causing symptoms in pediatric patients. This is a case of a 17-year-old female with a history of Arnold–Chiari malformation type I, presenting with right upper quadrant pain. Outside computed tomography reported a trilobed gall bladder, while magnetic resonance cholangiopancreatography demonstrated a duplicated gall bladder. Endoscopic resonance cholangiopancreatography (ERCP) showed a rare anatomic variant of duplicated gall bladder with an accessory right hepatic duct branching off the cystic duct. Due to complex anatomy, both indocyanine green and intraoperative cholangiogram (IOC) were utilized for a successful laparoscopic cholecystectomy. Only ERCP and IOC were able to clearly identify the aberrant right hepatic duct. Final pathology confirmed acute and chronic cholecystitis without dysplasia or cholelithiasis. This case highlights a rare anomaly of an aberrant right hepatic duct in the setting of gallbladder duplication in a pediatric patient. We would recommend both ERCP and IOC during the laparoscopic surgical approach as they were the only imaging modalities to identify the patient’s correct anatomy, likely due to the size of pediatric biliary structures.