With regard to acute pancreatitis: which of the following statements is/are correct?

a. The majority of patients presenting with acute pancreatitis of biliary type are female

c. The most common cause of acute pancreatitis in the United States is alcohol use

In autopsy series, the evidence for past acute pancreatitis averages 0.31%. Variations among populations are highly dependent on social factors such as ethanol use and on environmental and hereditary determinants such as the incidence of gallstones. Acute pancreatitis may occur at any age but is most common in adults between 30 and 70 years of age. In general, patients with gallstone-induced pancreatitis are older (age 40 to 60 years), whereas those with alcoholassociated pancreatitis are younger (age 30 to 40 years). The sex distribution of acute pancreatitis depends on the clinical cause of the disease, with women representing 68% of patients with gallstone-associated pancreatitis. Conversely, when alcohol is the primary association, men account for most patients.

Clinical associations with acute pancreatitis can be divided into three broad categories-biliary stones, ethanol, and others. Biliary tract stone disease and ethanol-induced pancreatitis account for most cases of acute pancreatitis reported worldwide. The particular distribution of causes reflects the source of the patient population evaluated. In a summary of 18 different reports of acute pancreatitis in the United States with a combined total of 7147 patients, 53% of patients were believed to have ethanol-induced disease, whereas 28% had proven biliary stones. In contrast, of 1539 patients reported on from Great Britain, 52% had gallstones, 7% were ethanol related, and 34% had no identifiable cause.