Agenesis of the gallbladder: contracted, operated or absent?

Gallbladder agenesis (GA) is an extremely rare condition. Some people with this rare condition can refer to hospital with biliary colic-like symptoms. This can lead to patients being misdiagnosed and unnecessarily operated. Here a 58-year-old female patient who presented with complaints of nausea, vomiting, abdominal pain is presented. Because of the pain in the back of the epigastric region, high serum amylase and lipase values, it was thought to be acute pancreatitis. Furthermore, gallbladder was absent, ductus choledocus was dilatated but intrahepatic bile ducts were normal in the sonographic examination and IV contrast enhanced abdominal computed tomography (CT) which were performed to investigate the etiology and the severity of pancreatitis. Upper abdominal Magnetic Resonance (MR) imaging and Magnetic Resonance Cholangiopancreatography (MRCP) examinations were performed to evaluate the biliary tract and gallstones more clearly on the patient who had no gallbladder operation history. Finally the patient was reported as gallbladder agenesis by MRCP. To avoid unnecessary surgical procedures, it is recommended that suspicious patients must to be evaluated with MRCP when gallbladder is not clearly identified via US or CT.