Hepatobiliary Pathology: Cholelithiasis: Gallstone embedded at the distal end of the common bile duct

A 1954 autopsy specimen from a 73 year old woman who died two hours after admission to hospital. She had had intermittent attacks of abdominal pain for eighteen months and was thought to have carcinoma of the stomach. No jaundice had ever occurred during the short spasms of pain she had experienced, but she was frequently sick at the onset of attacks. She attended Chelsea Women's Hospital for diagnostic x-ray but refused further treatment. At autopsy, other than the common duct stone, a second stone was found lying loose in a much distended gallbladder. No evidence of cholangitis or liver disease was found.