WORLD JOURNAL OF ADVANCE
HEALTHCARE RESEARCH

Zaidoon M. AL Taee*, Thayer M. Aboush and Raghad T. Aziz

ABSTRACT

Background: The most frequent surgical emergency worldwide is acute appendicitis. Although the exact causesof this illness are still unknown, it is most likely caused by luminal obstruction which is produced by internal orexternal compression, such as lymphoid hyperplasia or inspissated fecal debris or appendicoliths. Literaturereview shows that there is little evidence to justify the widespread practice of early appendectomy. Additionally,recent studies on pediatric patients indicate that delaying surgery while receiving intravenous fluid and antibiotictreatment is a viable option. Objective: To evaluate is better to do for pediatric patients with an acuteappendicitis, whether immediate appendectomy or it can be approached in a semi-elective manner. Methods: Thecurrent study is a hospital based retrospective case-series study. All patients with signs and symptoms of an acuteappendicitis who were hospitalized to Al-Khansa’a Teaching Hospital from the time period between the first ofOctober 2024 to end of October 2024 were included. The Questionnaire was composed of two parts, the firstincluded demographic information of the patients and the second covered specific acute appendicitis information.Results: The study included 52 participants; the mean age is 9.14 ± 4.21 years. 28 (53.86%) of them were malesand 24 (46.14%) were females, with male: female ratio = 1.16. the diagnosis of acute appendicitis was prevalentamong the age group of 5 – less than 10 years in 28 (53.86%) patients, followed by the age group of 10 - less than14 years in 16 (30.76%) patients, lastly; the age group of less than 5 years in 8 (15.38%) of the study population.Complicated appendicitis was prevalent among 7 (13.4%), while uncomplicated appendicitis was prevalent among45 (86.6%) of the study population. 5 out of 11 (45.45) patients with non-operative patients were from the agegroup of 5 – less than 10 years, of them 3 were males and 2 were females. But equal numbers of patients 3 out of11 (27.27%) (2 males and 1 female) were from the age group of 10 - less than 14 years and the age group of lessthan 5 years respectively. While, out of 41 patients treated by appendectomy; 38 (92.69%) of the patients did openlaparotomy while 3 (7.31%) patients did laparoscopic appendectomy. It’s evident than elevated WBC counts wasstatistically significant with more proportion among conservative group (P < 0.005). Moreover; body temperatureof more than 38 Co was statistically significant with more proportion among conservative group (P < 0.005).Furthermore; Alvardo score of more than 7 was statistically significant with more proportion among operativegroup (P < 0.005). Conclusions: Operative management of acute appendicitis is the main treatment choice ofuncomplicated acute appendicitis; conservative management can be useful for some cases. Alvarado score is auseful tool for detecting which patients need operation. More studies are needed to confirm which is treatmentoption is better.