ABSTRACT
Peritoneal tuberculosis is a common affection in the developing countries. Its frequency in the industrial countries is substantially increasing mainly due to AIDS pandemiy. In Morocco it occupies the third position after pulmonary tuberculosis and gangional tuberculosis. It represents 75%of abdominal localisations. In this study, we report 42 cases that were hospitalized at the pediatrics department at the Hassan II University Hospital of Fez, Morocco, Our patients, 22 boys and 20 girls, were aged between 1.5 and 14 years old with an average age of 7.7 years. They were vaccinated with BCG in 97%of cases. Twelve cases were due to contagion. The clinical profile was dominated by ascitis, abdominal pain sometimes with resemblance to surgical pathologies and acute fever. Association with other tuberculosis affections, mainly pleural tuberculosis, was observed in 17 cases. In 26 kids diagnosis was confirmed with histology. The scheme and the duration of anti-bacilli treatment varied depending on cases and the coarse was good in general. Based on these observations we can con that the incidence of peritoneal tuberculosis is still very high in Morocco, since the frequency of contagion is very important the screening remains obligatory, the delay of diagnosis is due to the clinical polymorphism and to the lack of bacteriological evidence