Acute large bowel obstruction: Is it mechanical or functional

ABSTRACT

The value of urgent contrast large bowel enema in the diagnosis and its impact on management of patients with acute large bowel obstruction has been tested. Twenty two patients were the subject of this study. Urgent contrast enema has been done in 13 patients. Correlation between clinical and radiological diagnosis revealed that differentiation between mechanical obstruction and pseudo obstruction can be difficult depending on clinical picture and plain X ray films. The clinical and plain radiological diagnosis was wrong in 22.5% of patients. On the other hand urgent contrast enema had a 100% accuracy. The importance of this investigation is to avoid unnesecessary operations in pseudo obstruction patients who are generally a high surgical risk