Background: Acute appendicitis is the most frequently encountered non-obstetric disease requiring surgical intervention during pregnancy. Early diagnosis reduces maternal and fetal morbidity / mortality rates.
Aim: This study aims to investigate hemogram parameters in the diagnosis of acute appendicitis in pregnant women.
Material and methods: A retrospective case-controlled study was conducted in three groups. Thirty-nine pregnant patients with acute appendicitis (Group A), 39 fertile nonpregnant patients with acute appendicitis (Group B), and 39 healthy pregnant women (Group C) were included in the study. WBC, neutrophil count, lymphocyte count, NLR, PLR, MPV and RDW values were compared.
Results: The mean NLR values in group A, group B and group C were 7.39 (1.58-46.6), 5.66 (1-20) and 4.23 (1.54-10.77) respectively, and there was a significant difference in NLR values between the groups (P= 0.002). The mean PLR values in group A, group B and group C were 159.09 (69.1-574), 134.28 (21.5-360) and 120 (68.7-334) and difference was statistically significant (P= 0.019). Cutoff points for WBC count was 14155 106/μL (51,3% sensitivity, 82,1% specificity), for neutrophil count is 10955 106/μL (53,8% sensitivity, 84,6% specificity), for NLR is 9.23 (46,2% sensitivity, 92,3% specificity) and PLR is 157,6 (51,3% sensitivity and 82,1% specificity) NLR had largest area under the curve with 0.667 NLR.
Conclusion: Neutrophil count, WBC and PLR were found to be the most valuable inflammatory parameters however, RDW, Lymphocyte count, and MPV levels are not found valuable markers in terms of sensitivity and specificity in the diagnosis of acute appendicitis in pregnant patients by this study.
Keywords: NLR; appendicitis; haemogram; pregnancy.