ACUTE ABDOMEN IN EMERGENCY DEPARTMENT: A DESCRIPTIVE STUDY

Abstract

Introduction. Acute abdomen is defined as an intra-abdominal process causing severe pain and often requiring surgical intervention, as it constitutes a life-threatening situation. The objective of this study is to evaluate the cases of acute abdomen presented to the emergency department at Baghdad Teaching Hospital and their final diagnoses at the surgical emergency ward where. A prospective study was conducted at the emergency department of Baghdad Teaching Hospital over a six-month period on a simple random sample of 100 patients with acute abdomen, selected between 1st August 2014 and the end of January 2015. The data was collected for patients presented to the emergency department with a chief complaint of acute abdominal pain. The researcher monitored the patients until they were discharged in order to ascertain the final diagnosis where The results demonstrated that the mean age of the patients was 34±17 years, with a male-to-female ratio of 3:1. The diagnosis of acute abdomen patients presented to the emergency department was appendicitis for 32% of patients, perforated viscus for 30% of patients (perforated DU for 17% of patients and gastric ulcer for 13% of patients), and cholecystitis for 28% of patients.

Furthermore, patients with non-specific pain constituted 10% of the total sample. Similarly, acute abdomen patients diagnosed with appendicitis exhibited a significant association with younger age (p < 0.001), while patients diagnosed with non-specific pain demonstrated a significantly shorter duration of chief complaint (p < 0.001) and we conclude the most frequent causes of acute abdomen pain among patients presented to the emergency department of Baghdad Teaching Hospital were acute appendicitis, perforated DU and GU, and cholecystitis. Female patients presented to the emergency department at a significantly earlier age than males.