Objective To evaluate retrospectively the clinical efficacy of percutaneous transhepatic gallbladder drainage (PTGBD) in the patients with acute biliary pancreatitis (ABP). Methods A total of 244 patients with ABP recei-ving treatment in our department from January 2014 to November 2021 were included in this study. There were 76 cases in study group using PTGBD treatment, among them, 41 cases with performed endoscopic retrograde cholangiopancreatography (ERCP) after symptoms remission, and 168 cases without PTGBD in control group with 49 cases using ERCP and 119 cases with conservative treatment. The rate of post-ERCP pancreatitis (PEP) and postoperative adverse events were compared between two groups. Results The rate of PEP was significantly lower in study group (11/41) than in control group (23/49), 26.8% vs.46.9%, P=0.008. The patients in both groups were performed cholecystectomy or cholecystectomy with bile duct drainage in late stage (73 cases in study group and 152 cases in control group). The shorter operative time [(76.3±28.3) min vs.(121.6±34.9) min, P=0.011], less intraoperative blood loss [(65.7±27.6) mL vs. (99.2±60.3) mL, P=0.028], shorter abdominal drainage duration [(3.6±2.5) d vs. (8.9±4.9) d, P=0.016] in study group than in control group. The rate of postoperative sepsis [2.7% (2 cases) vs. 5.3% (8 cases), P=0.003], rate of reoperation [1.4%(1 case) vs. 3.9%(6 cases), P<0.001], rate of admission to intensive care unit [4.1%(3 cases) vs. 7.2%(11 cases), P=0.028], and mortality [0 vs. 1.3% (2 cases), P<0.001] in study group were lower than those in control group. Conclusions PTGBD could be simple and effective in the treatment of ABP and consistent with treatment of damage control surgery which should be worthy clinical application.