The role of double-balloon enteroscopy in diagnosis of small intestinal malignancies

Objective:To evaluate the role of double-balloon enteroscopy in diagnosis of small intestinal malignancies.Methods:Seventy-six patients were examined for suspected small intestinal diseases by double-balloon enteroscopy.The enteroscope was introduced orally or anally.If no abnormalities were found by the first procedure,the patients were recommended the second examination by another procedure at selected time points.The detection rates of small intestinal abnormalities,especially malignancies,and diagnostic accuracy,tolerance,and frequency of adverse events of double balloon enteroscopy were then analyzed.Results:The overall detection rate of small intestinal diseases was 45.9%(10/34).The detection rate of small intestinal malignancies was 13.5%(10/74) which accounted for 29.4%(10/34) of all detected small intestinal abnormalities.Ten out of 11 patients with malignancies diagnosed by double-balloon enteroscopy were ultimately confirmed by pathological examination in surgery.One patient had benign small intestinal disease.The accuracy was 90.9%.Conclusions:Double-balloon enteroscopy appears to be a safe and effective method in the diagnosis of small intestinal diseases and could be served as the first option in the diagnosis of suspected small intestinal malignancies or as a complementary detection method after capsule endoscopy.