Incidence/Types (Appendicitis)

Graphic representation of the incidence of appendicitis and its types depending on the age. X-axis: Age from 1 to 15 years, y-axis: Number of cases. Black or red: Acute focal or acute suppurative appendicitis. Green: Perforated appendicitis with/without perityphlitic (= periappendical) abscess. Blue or punctuated: Other pathologies or macroscopically normal appendix. In this population of 94 children of the Emergency Department of Pediatric Surgery Bern of the year 1991 mainly schoolchildren are involved; patients aged up to 5 years only amount to 10 %. Of the latter group more than half have a perforated appendicitis with a diffuse peritonitis; this in contrast to the whole population with a perforation rate of 20 %. Other pathologies and/or a normal appendix amount to 10 %. Since that time the rate of perforation has not changed because the hospital is a tertiary center with some late allocations.