Breaking Age and Weight Limits: Shanghai Doctors Perform Endoscopic Ultrasound-Guided Pancreatic Duct Drainage in a Very Young Child

A team led by Deng Zhaohui, director of the gastroenterology department at Shanghai Children's Medical Center, performed endoscopic ultrasound-guided transduodenal pancreatic duct drainage (EUS-PDD) on a 2-year-old child weighing 12 kilograms who had pancreatic duct dilation. It is the youngest and lightest pediatric case of this procedure in publicly reported experience worldwide. The child was diagnosed at birth with duodenal stenosis and annular pancreas and underwent corrective surgery as a newborn.

From the age of 1 year and 8 months, pancreatitis recurred frequently, and a stone was present at the junction of the head and body of the pancreatic duct. Under international medical consensus, EUS-PDD is generally indicated for children over 3 years of age and weighing more than 15 kilograms. The team completed precise puncture localization under highly demanding conditions.

The child's vital signs were stable afterwards, with no bleeding, perforation or infection, and he was discharged on the second postoperative day, offering a new model for minimally invasive treatment of pancreatic disease in very young, low-weight children.