Leukocytic count in the diagnosis of acute appendicitis.

Two hundred and thirty-three patients with a pathological diagnosis of acute appendicitis from 1989 to 1990 were reviewed. A comparative series of 235 elective cases who were admitted during the same period, was similarly reviewed. Using these data, the binary tables could be constructed and the cutoff point was obtained by plotting the positive and negative predictive values. This series yielded the clinically significant laboratory findings that the cutoff point of total leukocytic count, percentage of neutrophils and total neutrophilic count were 11,500 mm3, 75 per cent and 8,000 mm3 respectively. Combined specificity of all three tests is higher (95.74%), but the sensitivity is lower (61.55%).