ACCURACY OF MODIFIED ALVARADO SCORE IN DIAGNOSIS OF ACUTE APPENDICITIS IN ADULTS

Abstract

Objective: To measure the accuracy of Modified Alvarado Score (MAS) in diagnosing suspected patients of acute appendicitis having MAS of 7 or above.
Design: Validation study.
Place and Duration of Study: Surgical Departments of Combined Military Hospital (CMH) and Military Hospital (MH) Rawalpindi from April 2006 April 2007.
Material and Methods: This study involved 100 patients who were operated with provisional diagnosis of acute appendicitis. Preoperatively MAS of each patient was calculated. Postoperatively appendices of all the patients were sent for histopathological examination and their results regarding presence or absence of acute appendicitis were then compared with MAS of there patients. The data was analyzed by using SPSS version 10.0.
Results: Staistical analysis showed that MAS of 7 or more has sensitivity of 88.88%, specificity of 71.42%, Positive Predictive Value 88.88% and Negative Predictive Value 71.4%. Accuracy of MAS was 84%.
Conclusion: MAS 7 or above is a reliable indicator of acute appendicitis clinically in adults. The number of negative appendicectomies can be reduced by using MAS in clinical practice.