Per D. Jones:

I'd look for alternative (but medically mainstream) approaches.

Seems like the folks who make the gadget that pulverizes kidney stones with
sonic waves did some tests on gall stones.   Dunno what the upshot was.

The advice I got was that once you've had the second attack, you have a choice:
do something now - on your schedule with your physicians; or have it removed in
some emergency room by persons unknown - and possibly via the non-laproscopic
procedure which takes much, much longer to recover from.

But what to do?   I had my gall bladder out in August of last year.   Dunno if
it was the anesthesia or what, but my feeling right now is that I am permanently
messed up.  I get tired/out of breath way, *way* too soon and I've lost much of
my mental focus.   Correlation with the operation is precise.   We all know that
correlation is not causation... but this one is pretty impressive.

OTOH, I know at least three other people who have had their gall bladder removed
and from their accounts it was more like having a wisdom tooth pulled than a
major operation.   One even had it done as an outpatient and experienced no
lasting problems.

Bottom line, seems to me like it can go either way and I wouldn't want to be the
one that cajoled somebody into a procedure that left them permanently damaged.

I have heard of Actigall . It is prescribed for patients who suffer
from gallstones. Actigall Actigall may be prescribed for patients who
are not in need of a surgical procedure to remove the gall bladder or
for patients who are not advised to undergo surgery due to other
medical problems.
You  can consult your doctor and go for it .

If her symptoms are indeed due to gallstones (headache/shoulder/neck pain
are not typical of gallbladder disease), or if she has acute inflammation of
the gallbladder, she needs her gallbladder removed surgically. Next "attack"
may result in emergency surgery, possibly open surgery instead of
laparoscopic, with significantly increased risk. If she's afraid of  a
simple gallbladder operation, she ought to be scared to death of an
emergency gallbladder operation.

There are no useful alternatives to surgery for symptomatic gallstones.
Cholelithotripsy has been so thoroughly disproven over the last 15 years
that I'm not sure you can find anyplace still doing them. Actigall is simply
a choleretic. It helps prevent gallstone formation, but once they're formed
it does nothing. Ursodeoxycholic acid or chenodeoxycholic acid MAY dissolve
some types of gallstones over a period of a couple of years, but those drugs
tend to have rather unpleasant side effects, and the gallstones will reform
withing 2 years of stopping the medication in over 80% of cases.

Note my initial statement above "IF her symptoms are indeed due to
gallstones.."  The mere presence of gallstones is not necessarily a reason
to remove the gallbladder, and your description of her symptoms is not
compelling for gallstones as a source those symptoms.

HMc