Computed tomography for diagnosis of acute appendicitis in adults

Summary

A Cochrane review «Computed tomography for diagnosis of acute appendicitis in adults»1 «Rud B, Vejborg TS, Rappeport ED et al. Computed to...»1 included 64 studies with a total of 10.280 participants (4583 with and 5697 without acute appendicitis). At the median prevalence of appendicitis (0.43), the probability of having appendicitis following a positive CT result was 0.92 (95% CI 0.90 to 0.94), and the probability of having appendicitis following a negative CT result was 0.04 (95% CI 0.03 to 0.05). In subgroup analyses according to contrast enhancement, summary sensitivity was higher for CT with intravenous contrast (0.96, 95% CI 0.92 to 0.98), CT with rectal contrast (0.97, 95% CI 0.93 to 0.99), and CT with intravenous and oral contrast enhancement (0.96, 95% CI 0.93 to 0.98) than for unenhanced CT (0.91, 95% CI 0.87 to 0.93).