Small bowel obstruction: sonographic evaluation.

Abstract

Results of 54 sonographic examinations of patients referred for suspected or known small intestinal obstruction were retrospectively correlated with surgical findings, and the diagnostic value of sonography regarding presence, level, and cause of obstruction was compared with that of plain abdominal radiography. The diagnosis of obstruction was correct in 89% of cases with sonography and in 71% with plain radiography. The level of obstruction was correctly predicted in 76% of cases with sonography and in 51% with plain radiography. The cause of obstruction was correctly predicted in 20% of cases with sonography and in 2% with plain radiography. The authors conclude that use of sonography in evaluating patients with bowel obstruction may be helpful in confirmation of the presence of obstruction, in determination of the level of obstruction, and in identification of the cause of obstruction.

Point-of-care ultrasonography for the diagnosis of small bowel obstruction in the emergency department

“…However, ultrasonography is uncommonly used by radiologists for this indication in North America. [7][8][9] When performed by radiologists, ultrasonography has a sensitivity of 95% and a specificity of 84% for SBO. 10 Radiologists use several measures when assessing for SBO by ultrasonography: dilated bowel (.…”

Small intestine contrast ultrasonography (SICUS) for the detection of small bowel complications in crohnʼs disease: A prospective comparative study versus intraoperative findings

“…39,40 MRI is a noninvasive, radiationsparing tool but its diagnostic accuracy in detecting SB strictures has not been assessed since no study has compared MRI findings with surgery, except for a promising report referring only to five patients. 36 Despite diagnosis with TUS of CD SB strictures being the object of several reports, 8,9,10,30,[41][42][43] a single study 8 used as reference standard only the surgical pathological findings, showing an excellent sensitivity (100%) and specificity (91%) in the detection of at least one stricture in patients submitted to surgery for obstructive symptoms. The present study confirms that TUS has a high sensitivity (87%) and specificity (100%) in the assessment of the presence of at least one stricture in patients with obstructive symptoms (data not shown), but in addition it shows that SICUS has a higher diagnostic accuracy than TUS to detect: 1) the presence of more than two strictures; 2) those located in the proximal tract of SB; 3) extension of strictures, independently from the presence of prestenotic dilatation and of obstructive symptoms.…”

Transabdominal sonography of the gastrointestinal tract

“…Overall, the accuracy of sonography in the detection of bowel obstruction is more than 90% [4,39,40]. The accuracy in detection of small bowel obstruction is higher than in the large bowel.…”

“…This may be caused by the variable sonographic appearance of the intestine. Furthermore, due to bowel gas, the posterior wall of the GI tract is often not visualized on transabdominal sonography; however, in many common and clinically important diseases, such as bowel obstruction, appendicitis, diverticulitis and Crohn's disease, sonography plays an important role in the diagnosis [1,2,3,4,5].…”