Acute Appendicitis
The vermiform appendix is part of the large intestine and constitutes an embryonic vestige. At a young age, it is rich in lymphoid tissue, which helps the body’s defence.
Acute Appendicitis
Acute Appendicitis is caused when the appendix becomes blocked. This may be due to mechanical reasons (blockage from faeces, solid food remnants) or to inflammation (viral infection, enterocolitis, etc.)
This blockage can cause oedema or even rupture of the appendix wall, resulting in the release of the appendix contents (faeces) inside the abdomen, which is followed by peritonitis. In that case, the patient should immediately go into surgery in order to have the vermiform appendix removed. Acute Appendicitis is the most known and frequent disease that requires surgery in adolescence or young age in general.
Symptoms and diagnosis
At the beginning acute appendicitis causes dull pain near the stomach and gastrointestinal 
disorders (vomiting or diarrhoea). Later, the pain moves lower on the right side and becomes persistent and torturous. Furthermore, there is an increase in fever. This condition requires immediate surgery.
The diagnosis of appendicitis is very important and it presents some difficulties, since the symptoms of appendicitis can be found in other abdominal diseases as well. Diseases with similar symptoms include gynaecological problems (such as salpingitis, corpus luteum cyst rupture, involuting ovarian cyst, ectopic pregnancy, etc.), adhesions in the area which cause bowel obstruction, mesenteric lymphadenitis (which develops in parallel or after a respiratory tract infection), and some colon diseases.
Can appendicitis be treated without surgery?
NO. An inflamed appendix that remains within the abdomen involves risks, such as peritonitis, adhesion development, intra-abdominal abscess or formation of an inflamed mass from bowel loops (the so-called plastron), which causes a big problem in the abdomen and renders a future operation more difficult.
Laparoscopic appendectomy
The appendectomy is performed through three 0.5-1 cm incisions. An enlarged image of the patient’s internal organs is displayed on a monitor of high resolution and definition. The appendix is removed 
very quickly and in a bloodless way, with specialized tools of small diameter. The patient can go home within 24 hours following the operation. Apart from the known advantages of a laparoscopic surgery (minimum postoperative pain, quick recovery, minimum surgical trauma, minimum trauma purulence), a further important advantage is that a parallel pathological condition (such as gynaecological problems or Meckel’s diverticulum), or a quite frequent ectopic position of the appendix (retrocaecal, subhepatic), which would require an extension of the initial incision, can be treated as well.
