DIFFERENTIATION OF INTRAHEPATIC AND EXTRAHEPATIC JAUNDICE

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Abstract
While in the majority of cases in which the patient enters the hospital with jaundice as the presenting complaint the cause can be diagnosed on the basis of the history and physical examination, there remains a certain group in which a decision as to whether the jaundice is of intrahepatic or extrahepatic origin cannot be made with certainty. In these cases laboratory tests must often be looked to for aid in the differential diagnosis. During the past ten years a wide variety of tests and technics have been devised as useful aids in the differential diagnosis of intrahepatic (catarrhal jaundice, hepatitis, cirrhosis of the liver and hepatic abscess) and extrahepatic jaundice (occlusion within or pressure from without the common bile duct). The use of these tests is predicated on the fact that jaundice of intrahepatic origin is more commonly associated with damage to the liver than is that due to