Elsevier

Annals of Medicine and Surgery

Volume 58, October 2020, Pages 147-150
Annals of Medicine and Surgery

Best Evidence Topic
Best evidence topic: Can acute appendicitis manifest with normal inflammatory markers?

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.amsu.2020.09.003Get rights and content
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Highlights

  • The aim is to asses the incidence of normal inflammatory markers among patients with acute appendicitis.

  • Seven articles were included in this best evidence topic.

  • Six articles agreed that normal inflammatory markers cannot exclude a diagnosis of acute appendicitis.

Abstract

A best evidence topic has been constructed using a described protocol. The three-part question addressed was: for patients with suspected acute appendicitis can normal inflammatory markers rule out the diagnosis? Altogether 151 papers were found using the search strategy reported below. Seven were identified to provide the best evidence to answer the question. The author, journal, date, and country of publication, patient group studied, study type, relevant outcomes, results, and study weaknesses were tabulated. In conclusion, six out of seven papers are more in favour with the concept that normal inflammatory markers cannot effectively rule out the diagnosis of acute appendicitis.

Keywords

Inflammatory markers (IM)
Acute appendicitis (AA)
C-reactive protein (CRP)
White cell counts (WCC)

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