Gestational factors of appendicitis and postoperative complications: integrative literature review

Abstract

Objective: To present, through an integrative literature review, the main gestational factors for the occurrence of appendicitis and postoperative complications. Methods: This is an integrative literature review study. The guiding question of the study was: “What are the main gestational factors for the occurrence of appendicitis and postoperative complications?”. Results: From the search strategy adopted in this study, predefined inclusion and exclusion criteria were listed 45 articles and 30 articles were chosen to compose the sample. Final considerations: It was noticed that when it comes to appendicitis during pregnancy, the treatment becomes a great challenge. When pregnant women have acute abdominal pain resulting from delayed appendectomy, diagnostic accuracy is very important, as false-positive diagnoses can bring unnecessary risk to pregnant women when surgery is required, although laparoscopic appendectomy is relatively safe. The design and performance of future studies should guide in this direction, in accordance with all the other factors that would outline the superiority of the laparoscopic approach.