Erect esophageal transit scintigraphy, manometry, and barium swallow in assessment of patients with achalasia before and after balloon dilation

Abstract

Background: Achalasia is a motility disorder of unknown etiology. Diagnostic techniques include Barium esophagram, simple and widely available, radionuclide transit/emptying scintigraphy, a low-cost procedures, easy to perform and widely available, well tolerated and require minimum cooperation by patients and esophageal manometry that continues to be used widely in clinical practices, primarily because of its perceived value. Aim of this study was to compare methods of manometry, barium swallow and scintigraphy before and after pneumatic dilation. Methods and Materials: 17 patients with achalasia of cardia were evaluated both symptomatically and objectively (esophageal manometry, timed barium esophagram, and scintigraphic emptying index) before treating them with pneumatic dilation and after. The degree of patient symptom improvement post therapy was recorded and correlated with improvement of three methods indices. The degree of improvement after treatment was determined as the percentage of reduction of symptoms, divided into two groups (1)