Well, the future is now because investigators from the United Kingdom and Canada just published a meta-analysis including 10 papers and 413 children about the efficacy and safety of nonoperative treatment for appendicitis in children.
They concluded that nonoperative management is effective in 96% of children with acute uncomplicated appendicitis during their initial hospitalizations with just 17 (4%) children requiring appendectomy before discharge. An additional 68 (16.4%) developed recurrent appendicitis later, and 19 of these patients were treated with the second course of antibiotics. The other 49 underwent appendectomy with histologic evidence of recurrent appendicitis.
Another 11 patients underwent appendectomy in the follow-up period for various reasons. In all, 77 (18.6%) patients initially treated with antibiotics eventually underwent appendectomy.
Although the initial hospital length of stay for appendectomy was shorter than that of patients treated with antibiotics, complication rates were similar.
These findings were met with headlines like "Antibiotics, not surgery, could treat appendicitis in children, study suggests" from The Guardian and "Is Surgery Always Needed for Kids' Appendicitis?" from US News.
What are the problems with this paper?