In this study, we used the endoscopic classification of papilla proposed by Haraldsson [6]. Small papilla (Type 2) and protruding or pendulous papilla (Type 3) were risk factors for failed SBC, compared with regular papilla (Type 1). In addition, cancer-related biliary obstruction and age were additional risk factors for SBC failure. Papilla types were not significant risk factors for any post-ERCP complications in the multivariate analysis. However, Type 2 papilla had a higher PEP frequency than the other types of papillae.
SBC is the first and most important step in ERCP. In the field of pancreatobiliary endoscopy, consistently achieving SBC is a milestone. The papilla itself can affect the difficulty of SBC. However, few studies have discussed the association between cannulation success and papilla morphology. In 2017, Haraldsson et al. proposed four types of papilla. This classification has substantial inter- and intra-observer agreement[6]. In another study, the authors found that SBC was more difficult for Type 2 and Type 3 papilla[8]. The definition of difficult cannulation that was used in the study was more than 5 minutes, 5 attempts, or 2 pancreatic guidewire passages, as per the Scandinavian Association of Digestive Endoscopy group study [9]. Our study had a similar finding. The percentages of cases with a cannulation time above 5 minutes for the four types papillae were 43.22% (Type 1), 68.00% (Type 2), 69.84% (Type 3), and 63.75% (Type 4). We also investigated the risk factors of cannulation failure, which was not discussed by Haraldsson et al. Other important risk factors for cannulation failure like age and malignancy related obstruction was not investigated in Haraldsson’s study. This is the most important difference between Haraldsson’s study and our study. In addition, cannulation failure means the patient needs another ERCP or alternative intervention for their disease, leading to increased medical cost and risk of complications. The biliary endoscopist should be especially cautious when attempting to cannulate Type 2 and Type 3 papillae.
Recently, another classification system of papillae was proposed by Watanabe et al[10]. Two important features of papilla were defined in this system. The first is the oral protrusion pattern, which indicates the ratio of the length of oral protrusion to the transverse diameter of the papilla, and it comprises three types: small (Protrusion-S), for which the ratio is less than one-half; regular (Protrusion-R), for which the ratio is one-half or more, but less than 2; and large (Protrusion-L), for which the ratio is 2 or more. They also identified Protrusion-L, which is very similar to Type 3 Papilla in the classification proposed by Haraldsson et al., as a significant risk factor for difficult biliary duct cannulation. The key feature of Type 3 Papilla and Protrusion-L papilla is large oral protrusion, with a longer biliary duct in the intramural distance. This may result in misalignment between the ERCP catheter and the biliary duct axis during biliary cannulation[10], thus leading to difficult cannulation and failure.
According to Watanabe et al., Protrusion-S is similar to the Type 2 papilla in Haraldsson’s classification. They found Protrusion-S was not difficult to cannulate. In contrast, Type 2 papilla was difficult to cannulate according to findings reported by Haraldsson and in the present study. This discrepancy in findings may be due to the fact that Protrusion-S was not exactly the same as Type 2 papilla. The defining feature of Type 2 Papilla is its small size. The small orifice of the papilla may explain why it is difficult to cannulate. It is often hard to insert the papillotome into the small biliary orifice. In contrast, the definition of Protrusion-S papilla is that it consists of a short oral protrusion. An oral protrusion that is short often means the intramural part of the bile duct is short, which is an obstacle for deep cannulation. It is often relatively easy to overcome a short intramural bile duct in Protrusion-S papilla.
We found age was a risk factor for cannulation failure. This result was similar to a finding reported by Emre et al[11]. They found the failure rate of cannulation had increased by 1.01-fold for each one-year increase in the patient's age. Lobo et al. [12]found that cannulation success rates decreased significantly due to PAD as age increased. However, we found no significant relation between cannulation failure and PAD (we only included type 2 PAD and type 3 PAD). We excluded type 1 PAD because it made classification of papilla difficult. In our experience, large PAD type 1, which may obscure the papilla and distort its orientation, often makes SBC difficult. However, other age-related factors can cause cannulation difficulty. For example, duodenal distortion increases with age due to ulcers and cholangitis, which may make it difficult for operators to keep a good axis when approaching the papilla, thus resulting in difficult cannulation.
Fukatsu et al. [13] found malignant biliary stricture was a risk factor for needle-knife precut papillotomy. Freemann and Guda [3] also showed that malignant biliary tract obstructions decrease the cannulation success rate during ERCP. Our data also revealed malignancy-related biliary obstruction was a risk factor for cannulation failure. The cause of difficult cannulation in cancer patients may be due to tumor infiltration distorting and complicating endoscopic access to the ducts. Moreover, in patients with malignancy, papilla edema, trauma, and bleeding readily occur during ERCP because of fragile biliary tracts and vasculature, which thus makes cannulation more difficult[4].
Complications
Our post-ERCP complication rates were similar to those of Haraldsson’s study[8]. Though we had not found any risk factors for post ERCP complications, the incidence rate of PEP was significantly higher for Type 2 papilla than for the other types. This finding is similar to that of Haraldsson’s study [8], i.e., small papillae were found to be associated with frequency of PEP, which increased in parallel with the frequency of difficult cannulation. We speculate that the cause of higher PEP rate in our Type 2 papilla was because endoscopic papilla balloon dilatation (EPBD) was used more often for this classification of papilla. In our cohort, the rate of EPBD for Type 2 papilla was 12%, which was much higher than that for the other types of papilla (p= 0.003). It is well known that EPBD with small-caliber (diameter=8-10mm) balloons increase PEP rate[14]. In our hospital, we preferred sphincterotomy over EPBD (diameter 8-10mm was typically used) for most cases. But for some Type 2 papilla, we favored EPBD over sphincterotomy in order to reduce the risk of perforation. This preference was supported by a previous study that found small papilla was a risk factor for perforation associated with sphincterotomy[15].
Limitation
This study had several limitations. First, the type of each papilla was classified by the endoscopist who performed that ERCP. There may be some disagreement among the endoscopists. However, our interobserver agreement evaluation shows moderate to substantial agreement, which is similar to that of Haraldsson’s study[6]. In addition, in our study, experienced endoscopists rather than fellows, determine the type of papilla. Therefore, we think the classifications of papilla in our study is reliable.
Second, biliary cannulation was often started by a fellow rather than an experienced specialist in our hospital. According to Haraldsson’s study, the rate of failed cannulation increased significantly when a fellow attempted the initial cannulation, even when an experienced endoscopist took over the biliary cannulation after five minutes. [8] Therefore, the rate of failed cannulation in our study might have been lower if experienced endoscopists had initially performed all biliary cannulations. However, we did not record the cannulation time of the fellows and experienced endoscopists, so it was not possible to estimate the influence of this variable on our study results. On the other hand, our rate of failed cannulation was only 5.94%. In previous report, SBC can fail in up to 20% of cases even when performed by expert biliary endoscopists.[2] We think the influence of trainee involvement was not so huge in our hospital. Further study is needed to evaluate whether type 2 and type 3 papilla are risk factors for failed cannulation when performed solely by expert endoscopists.