Retrospective Study
Copyright ©The Author(s) 2020. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Clin Cases. Oct 6, 2020; 8(19): 4349-4359
Published online Oct 6, 2020. doi: 10.12998/wjcc.v8.i19.4349
Managing acute appendicitis during the COVID-19 pandemic in Jiaxing, China
Yuan Zhou, Lu-Sha Cen
Yuan Zhou, Department of Gastrointestinal Surgery, The First Hospital of Jiaxing, Affiliated Hospital of Jiaxing University, Jiaxing 31400, Zhejiang Province, China
Lu-Sha Cen, Department of Ophthalmology, The First Affiliated Hospital of Zhejiang Chinese Medical University, Hangzhou 310006, Zhejiang Province, China
Author contributions: Zhou Y and Cen LS contributed equally to this manuscript; Zhou Y participated in study design, drafted the manuscript, was involved in data collection, and assisted with data analysis; Cen LS participated in design, was involved in data collection, and supervised the study; All authors have read and approved the final version of the manuscript.
Supported by Jiaxing Key Discipline of Medicine-Oncology (Supporting Subject), No. 2019-zc-11.
Institutional review board statement: The study was reviewed and approved by the Ethics Committee of the First Hospital of Jiaxing.
Informed consent statement: All study participants, or their legal guardian, provided informed written consent prior to study enrollment.
Conflict-of-interest statement: No conflict-of-interest statement declared.
Data sharing statement: Technical appendix, statistical code, and dataset available from the corresponding author at Cenlusa2@sina.com.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article that was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Corresponding author: Lu-Sha Cen, MD, Attending Doctor, Department of Ophthalmology, The First Affiliated Hospital of Zhejiang Chinese Medical University, No. 54 Youdian Road, Hangzhou 310006, Zhejiang Province, China. cenlusa2@sina.com
Received: June 18, 2020
Peer-review started: June 18, 2020
First decision: July 24, 2020
Revised: August 5, 2020
Accepted: September 2, 2020
Article in press: September 2, 2020
Published online: October 6, 2020
Core Tip

Core Tip: This retrospective study evaluated the efficacy of the management of acute appendicitis during the coronavirus disease 19 (COVID-19) pandemic. Emergency preoperative management included appendicitis evaluation and COVID-19 screening. Our research showed that the number of perforated appendicitis with longer chief complaint duration was higher than last year. The shunt used in the simple and complex groups not only supplied appropriate treatment but also reduced the pressure for emergency surgery preparation. Laparoscopic appendectomy was recommended if COVID-19 screening results were negative. No COVID-19 infection occurred. Our management effectively reduced the influence of the pandemic and minimized nosocomial infection risk.