To know what is acute pancreatitis, you should know what is pancreas. Pancreas is a gland or an endocrine gland. A gland which produces the digestive juices which is attached to the intestinal part called the duodenum. The secretions of the pancreas are known to digest a lot of proteins and a lot of lipase foods or lipid foods, when the food reaches the intestine, it gets mixed and it also changes the chemical content of the food itself for improving the digestion of food. What happens in pancreatitis is there is some injury in the pancreas. For different reasons like it could be obstructive lesion or it could be stone in the gall bladder could be injuring the pancreas or it could be infection in the pancreas like viral pancreatitis or it could be congenital reasons or the pancreatic secretions that come out of the pancreas, they rupture and they come out of the pancreas and they come in to the abdominal wall. That means the pancreatic juice that has to digest the food starts digesting the normal organs in the intestine and the abdomen. So this creates an excessive amount of digestion. So pancreatitis is a common entity following alcoholism. So any individual who is alcoholic is very likely to get pancreatitis. So once the juice enters the abdomen and causes and creates an inflammation, individuals will have a lot of pain and there will be a collection of fluid in the abdomen because of inflammation. So when you do an ultrasound , there is a lot of juice in the pancreas and pancreatic changes may be visible or not visible and the cause of fluid accumulation in the pancreas can be visible and it can be present in the form of cyst formation or fluid In the peritoneum is seen in case of massive ascites. So depending upon the grade and the presentation, the ultrasound presentation may be different. But you may have to do CT scan and serum amylase levels as it is one of the enzymes that enters the circulation in case of pancreatitis. So it has rot be estimated in case of CT scan is more important than an ultrasound. So many times if it is mild pancreatitis, ultrasound may not show anything but if it is moderate or severe pancreatitis, you may see the consequences of what is happening in the abdomen.
