Diagnosis and management of acute abdominal pain in childhood

Abstract

It is estimated that between 100 and 120 children are admitted to hospital each day in Great Britain because of acute abdominal pain.’ Between one third and a half of these admissions are for acute nonspecific abdominal pain, whilst another third are for acute appendicitis (Table 1). These two conditions therefore account for the majority of childhood admissions for acute abdominal pain and will be discussed in detail. A variety of important rarer causes will also be considered in this review. The data base for this population of children admitted to hospital owes much to the pioneering efforts of de Dombal and co-workers in Leeds who initiated a system for computer-aided diagnosis of the acute abdomen. This system was of limited value when applied to children4 but it fostered the widespread adoption of structured, computerised data collection methods, which has enabled traditional concepts of acute abdominal pain to be challenged and revised.