Point of Care Ultrasound for Evaluation of Suspected Appendicitis in the Emergency Department

Study Summary

The primary purpose of this study is to determine the accuracy of ultrasound (US) in diagnosing appendicitis in emergency department (ED) patients, as compared to the criterion standards of computed tomography, operative reports, or discharge diagnosis. The secondary purposes of the study include evaluation of the effect of ultrasound for appendicitis on the patient length of stay in the emergency department, the diagnostic utility of specific ultrasound findings in the diagnosis of appendicitis, the role of body mass index (BMI) in the utility of ultrasound for appendicitis and relation of ultrasound findings to the Alvarado score. The study will also examine the inter-rater agreement between point-of- care sonographers' interpretation and blinded reviewers' interpretation of the ultrasound images.

Primary Outcome

The performance of point-of-care ultrasound for appendicitis will be evaluated by comparing each ultrasound to the criterion standard of computed tomography (CT) for each enrolled patient. If a CT is not obtained, then operative report/findings, discharge diagnosis or phone follow up at 2 weeks will be used as the criterion standard to which the ultrasound will be compared. Using the criterion standard as the definitive diagnosis for each patient (i.e. presence or absence of appendicitis), each

Conditions Studied

Interventions

• PROCEDURE Ultrasound for Appendicitis

Study Locations (1)