[Cryptogenic liver abscess (author's transl)].

The successful treatment of two patients with cryptogenic liver abscess, a special type of pyogenic abscess, is reported. Quick diagnosis by methods which do not distress the patient, e. g. scintigraphy and echography, leads to a decisive improvement in the prognosis. Opinions are given on the differential diagnosis of cryptogenic, pyogenic and parasitic (amebic) liver abscesses. The good chances for treatment of cryptogenic abscesses compared with the secondary pyogenic liver abscesses are to be found not least in their usually solitary appearance. This is shown particularly clearly in the classification of the patients operated on for pyogenic liver abscess in our hospital in the last ten years into multiple and solitary liver abscess. As in the pyogenic abscess, so in the primary cyptogenic liver abscess is transperitoneal open drainage the method of choice for treatment.