ABSTRACT
Thomson from Edinburgh described an infant dying from cirrhosis secondary to congenital biliary obstruction in 1891. Surgical exploration was advocated from the 1930s and the terms ‘correctable’ and ‘non-correctable’ became prevalent to describe what could be done with a conventional surgical operation (e.g. hepaticojejunostomy). However, as most cases of biliary atresia were anatomically ‘noncorrectable’, their outlook was poor and true survivors were exceptional.
