Findings in appendectomy reported from University of Washington.

In this recent report, researchers in the United States conducted a study "To evaluate negative appendectomy (NA) and the relationship of NA and computed tomography (CT) and/or ultrasound (US). Background Information: NA may be influenced by the use and accuracy of preoperative CT/US."

"The Surgical Care and Outcomes Assessment Program (SCOAP) gathers chart-abstracted process of care data (such as CT/US accuracy) for general surgical procedures (including appendectomy) at most Washington State hospitals. We determined the prevalence of NA and CT/US concordance at the 15 SCOAP hospitals with >50 consecutive patients undergoing appendectomy (2006-2007). The number of patients who underwent urgent appendectomies was 3540. The percentage of patients who had imaging (CT-91%) was 86% (women-89%, men-83%). The use of imaging ranged across hospitals from 56% to 97%. There was 91% agreement between imaging and pathology report findings (92.3%-CT and 82.4%-US). The overall rate of NA was 6% (women-8%, men-4%). The prevalence of NA was 9.8% among patients having no imaging, 8.1% among those having an US, and 4.5% in those having a CT. Among patients with NA, CT/US was obtained in 75%; correct in 10% and incorrect or ambiguous in 65%. Higher rates of NA were correlated with lower rates of CT/US concordance (r = -0.57). There was no significant difference in rates of perforation between those with (17%) and ...