Retrocecal Ascending Appendix Attached to the Hepatic Flexure and Right Intra-abdominal Testis Identified During Open Appendicectomy: A Case Report.

Appendicectomy, or the removal of the appendix, is an emergency procedure following symptomatic acute appendicitis. Diagnosis is made on clinical examination but can be confirmed on imaging if other abnormalities are suspected. A few variants of appendix anatomical position exist that can be difficult to manage. In addition, secondary findings during surgery can come unexpectedly. We report a case of a 14-year-old male, who presented to the emergency department at our government institution with abdominal pain and vomiting. Examination revealed an empty right scrotum, which was unnoticed by the patient and never examined previously due to residence in an area of limited healthcare access. Ultrasound done elsewhere was inconclusive. The surgical intervention showed a retrocecal appendix attached to an ascending colon terminating at hepatic flexure. The procedure was further complicated by the presence of the right intra-abdominal testis located below the cecum. Excised samples were sent for histopathology, and the patient was followed with biopsy reports. This case highlights the challenges encountered during routine appendicectomy with unusual findings.

Incremental hospital utilization and mortality associated with co-morbid depression in pediatric hospitalizations.

OBJECTIVE: The objective of this study was to evaluate the association between hospital utilization and mortality and the presence of co-morbid depression in pediatric hospitalizations. METHODS: Using the Kids' Inpatient Database (KID) for 2012, a nationally representative database of all inpatient admissions in the United States of America for patients younger than 21 years of age compiled by the Health Care Utilization Project (HCUP), we obtained hospital records for children aged 6-20 years with any one of the 10 most common diagnoses in this population excluding affective disorders. After using one to one propensity score matching on age, race, gender, obesity, insurance type, hospital location and hospital size to ensure exchangeability between the groups, we compared the Length of Stay (LOS), Total Hospital Costs (THC) and mortality in children with and without reported comorbidity depression. We employed descriptive statistics and linear regression methods in our analyses RESULTS: A total of 667,968 discharges were extracted estimating a total of 937,971 discharges for children aged 6 - 20 with a primary diagnosis of any one of the 10 most common non-affective diagnoses in 2012. The prevalence of comorbid depression was about 2.9%. Propensity score matching produced 17,071 pairs. The mean LOS among patients with comorbid depression (4.63 days) was 0.89 days (95% CI: 0.74-1.05 days) higher than among patients without comorbid depression (3.74 days). The mean THC among patients with comorbid depression ($10,643) was $2,961 (95% CI: $2,401-$3,512) higher than among children without comorbid depression ($7,682). The odds of death as an outcome among the depressed was 1.77 (95% CI 1.13-2.77) times the odds among non-depressed patients. CONCLUSIONS: These findings show that comorbid depression significantly increases hospital utilization and mortality in childhood hospitalizations.