Sana Wasim, Misbah Durrani, Fazal Hussain Shah, Bilal Altaf.
Validity of Grey Scale Ultrasonography (US) in Diagnosis of Acute Appendicitis in Children.
Ophthalmol Update Jan ;13(4):300-3.

Background: Acute appendicitis is one of the important causes of abdominal pain and discomfort in children. The diagnosis of acute appendicitis in children is a challenge due to improper history and examination. Grey Scale Ultrasound (US) may be useful adjunct for surgeons to diagnose appendicitis in children. Materials & Methods: We included 73 children with clinical diagnosis of acute appendicitis. Grey scale ultrasonography was done in all patients. Histopathological diagnosis was considered as gold standard. The sensitivity, specificity, positive predictive value (PPV) and negative predictive values (NPV) were calculated for US. Data was analyzed by SPSS version 22. Results: In our study the frequency of acute appendicitis on histopathology (gold standard) was recorded in 84% (n=62) while it is absent in 15% (n=11) patients. The US examination showed 98.33% sensitivity, 76.92% specificity, 95.16% PPV and 90.91% NPV for the diagnosis of acute appendicitis in children. Conclusion: The grey scale US is very useful investigation for the diagnosis of acute appendicitis in children in spite of sophisticated investigations like computed tomography (CT) and laproscopy, thus decreasing the cost and improving the outcome.

PakMediNet -Pakistan's largest Database of Pakistani Medical Journals - http://www.pakmedinet.com