A guidewire-assisted endoscopic knife-cutting salvage technique for near-total esophageal obstruction

There are many potential strategies for endoscopic treatment of benign esophageal strictures. However, total esophageal strictures still remain difficult to treat. We report a case of a 53-year-old woman with a near-total esophageal stricture with multiple webs and postoperative stenosis. A guidewire-assisted endoscopic cutting method and endoscopic dilation technique were used for total esophageal obstruction in a relatively long segment in a patient with Plummer-Vinson syndrome. This case shows that balloon dilation plus guidewire-assisted endoscopic cutting may be an effective salvage therapy for near-total esophageal obstruction when performed by experienced endoscopists.