J Trauma
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Hospitalization for observation is the current standard of practice for patients who have sustained blunt abdominal trauma and who do not require emergent operation, despite having undergone diagnostic studies that exclude the presence of an intra-abdominal injury. The reasons for this practice are multifactorial and include the perceived false-negative rate of all standard diagnostic tests, the belief that hospitalization will allow for the prompt diagnosis of occult injuries, and medicolegal considerations about the risk of early discharge. The focus of this study was to determine whether hospitalization for observation is necessary after a negative diagnostic evaluation after blunt abdominal trauma, to determine the negative predictive value of abdominal computed tomographic (CT) scanning in a prospective series of patients, and to identify which patients can be safely released from the emergency department without observation or hospitalization after blunt abdominal trauma. ⋯ These data indicate that abdominal tenderness is not predictive of an abdominal injury and that patients with a negative CT scan after suspected blunt abdominal trauma do not benefit from hospital admission and prolonged observation.