Thursday, November 4, 2010

Delayed appendectomy

This article reviews a recent study published in the September Archives of Surgery that suggests it may be safe to delay an appendectomy in adults, even for over 12 hours.

We're not in the US, but we can offer decent supportive care here in rural Indonesia, and from what I can discern from the article, I think this study is good news for low-resource or remote practitioners. Fluids, antibiotics, one gives those, of course, but we probably have time to safely transfer a patient to a surgeon if he presents to our remote clinic with suspected appendicitis. That's nice to know.

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