California medicine
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Acute appendicitis still is a cause of considerable morbidity and now and then of death. The diagnostic accuracy in 316 patients operated on for acute appendicitis at Holy Cross Hospital was 76 per cent. ⋯ A study of 30 patients with mesenteric lymphadenitis who were inadvertently operated on in the belief they had appendicitis, revealed that this condition is most likely to occur in young females with only a slight increase in the number of leukocytes. Although positive diagnosis of acute appendicitis is a difficult problem, the morbidity associated with needless operation is so much less than that which occurs in acute perforated appendicitis, that prompt exploration in any questionable case seems warranted.