Acupuncture at the points Riyue andQimen in the treatment of choledocholithia-sis were quite effective and in many instancesgallstones were expelled spontaneously.Although the treatment has been widelyadopted in this country

yet the mechanismof action remains unexplained.During oral cholecystography and T tubecholangiography

acupuncture needles wereapplied to the points Riyue and Qimen andthe size of the gallbladder measured before

during and after the manipulation

and thepassage of the contrast medium into thedoudenum were observed.The result showed:immediately after puncturing

the gallblad-der evidently contracted（P 0.02—0.01）

but it was less prominent as compared withthat after a fatty meal（P<0.001）.In our cinecholangiography

the relaxa-tion of the sphincter of Oddi is associatedwith relaxation of the adjacent segment ofduodenum

Similarly

contraction of thesphincter is associated with contraction of thesurrounding duodenum.It was also revealedthat the sphincteric area opened from abovedownwards and closed in the reverse direction.The whole sequence of changes demonstratedthe duodenal-sphincteric synergy quite well.In the T-tube cinecholangiography

thesphincter of Oddi opened more frequentlyand for a more longer period during andafter acupuncture

which correlates with thecontraction of the gallbladder synchronously.The authors hold that the expelling ofthe choieliths can’t be simply explained bythe“Open-Close”hypothesis which describedthe mechanism as increasing of pressure inthe bile duct caused by contraction of thesphincter muscle during acupuncture mani-pulation and the increased flow of bile withrelaxation of the sphincter of Oddi afterpuncturing.