IStock Photo 5375735 © Muammer Mujdat Uzel

What do pop artist Andy Warhol, former attorney general John Ashcroft, and the Dalai Lama have in common?

Answer: They all suffered from gallstones.

Less familiar than their cousins the kidney stones, gallstones are hardened bits of bile that, when they get stuck in one of the ducts that drain the gallbladder, can cause episodes of abdominal pain so sudden and sharp they're nicknamed "gallbladder attacks."

A 3-inch-long pouch nestled beneath the liver, the gallbladder stores bile and squeezes it out into the small intestine like a pastry tube to help digest fats. The liquid bile can clump into pebbles if its ingredients are out of balance.

Almost 80% of gallstones are yellowy-green cholesterol stones, formed when—you guessed it—there's too much cholesterol in the bile. The other kind, called pigment stones, are smaller, darker, and thought to form when the bile contains too much of the waste product bilirubin. Risk factors include obesity, a high-fat diet, age, family history, cirrhosis, blood disorders, and cholesterol-lowering medicines.

One little gallbladder can hold hundreds of sand grain-sized stones—as supposedly happened to the Dalai Lama—or a single stone as big as a golf ball. Ouch.

A gallstone-provoked blockage is not only painful, it can trigger swelling or an infection in the duct, gallbladder, liver, or pancreas. Those infections can be fatal if they aren't treated. And gallstones are the main risk factor for developing gallbladder cancer.

Gallbladder removal, or cholecystectomy, is the preferred treatment for painful gallstones. It's been practiced for two centuries; former US president James K. Polk survived having his gallbladder removed in 1812 with nothing but brandy for the pain. Fortunately, today gallbladder surgery is much safer. Although Warhol died of a heart attack following gallbladder surgery, both Ashcroft and the Dalai Lama—along with thousands of Americans each year—came through the routine procedure with no problem.

Based on a 2008 report by the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases, the odds a person will visit an ambulatory care facility for gallstones in a year are 1 in 226.1, and the odds a person will be hospitalized for gallstones in a year are 1 in 834.2. (The report says the hospitalization numbers would be higher if more gallbladder surgeries required an overnight stay.) In both cases, the chances are twice as high for men as for women, and twice as high for people aged 65 or older as for people aged 15-44.

One theory holds that Alexander the Great—who ultimately fell ill instead of falling in battle— died of a pancreatic infection brought on by gallstones. These days, the odds the death of a person will be due to gallstones are 1 in 2,196. And the odds the death of a person 65 or older will be due to gallstones are 1 in 1,900.

So the chances of succumbing to gallstones—or their treatments—are low.

But if you're one of those unlucky few, at least you'll be in good company.