ABSTRACT
Cholelithiasis is a relatively uncommon condition in childhood except when it is associated with increased hemolysis such as congenital spherocytosis or sickle-cell anemia. Open cholecystectomy was the gold standard for the removal of a diseased gallbladder until 1987, when the French gynecologist Mouret described laparoscopic cholecystectomy in a human. The report was soon followed by similar reports of successful laser laparoscopic cholecystectomy by Reddick and Olsen in North America and Dubois and Perissat in France. These reports saw the explosion of advanced laparoscopic surgery, which has established laparoscopic cholecystectomy today as the gold standard and the operation of choice for the removal of a diseased gallbladder.
