Chronic pancreatitis is a disease of the heterogenous etiology. Chronic pancreatitis insufficiency is the most commonly caused by chronic alcohol abuse.
The mechanism by which ethanol abuse and the other etiologic factors results in chronic destructive changes in the pancreas is unknown. A new classification system (TIGAR-O) proposes risk modifiers – not etiologies – that may interact in any one patient to produce pancreatic disease. Each of the listed risk factors may predispose toward pancreatitis through different pathogenetic mechanism.