Abstract

Background
/Aims: In a previous study examining long- term exposure to contrast media, high-osmolar ionic contrast media were reported to be more cytotoxic to gallbladder epithelial cells than low-osmolar nonionic contrast media. However, biliary epithelial cells are rarely exposed to contrast media for such long periods in clinical practice. This study compared the cytotoxicity of two types of contrast media to gallbladder epithelial cells exposed for a short-term. Methods: Ioxithalamate and iopromide were tested, and dog gallbladder epithelial cells were used as the test cells. The cells were exposed to the two contrast agents with increasing iodine concentration and osmolality for 30 minutes. The number of cells, aneuploidy and supernatant LDH activities were measured each day. Results: The growth of cells exposed to the two contrast media was significantly reduced but there was no difference between the two contrast media at the same iodine concentration. The level of cell lysis measured by the supernatant LDH activities before the triton X-100 treatment was similar with the two contrast media. No aneuploidy fraction was detected in any of the cell groups treated with the two contrast media for 5 days. Conclusions: In contrast to previous results, high-osmolar ionic and low-osmolar nonionic contrast media with short- term exposure were found to have a similar cytotoxicity to biliary epithelial cells. (Korean J Gastrointest Endosc 2006;32:101⁣108)

• Keywords: Contrast media, Gallbladder epithelial cells, ERCP, Cytotoxicity