Quality indicators in endoscopic retrograde cholangiopancreatography: a brief review of established guidelines

Endoscopic retrograde cholangiopancreatography (ERCP) is an invasive endoscopic technique that has many diagnostic and therapeutic implications. It is a procedure with small but significant life-threatening complications. To ensure the best possible care, minimize complications, and improve the quality of health care, a constant review of the performance of the operator using ideal benchmark standards is needed. Hence, quality indicators are necessary. The American and European Societies of Gastrointestinal Endoscopy have provided guidelines on quality measures for ERCP, which describe the skills to be developed and training to be implemented in performing quality ERCP. These guidelines have divided the indicators into pre-procedure, intraprocedural, and post-procedure measures. The focus of this article was to review the quality indicators of ERCP.