Introduction
Certain gastrointestinal disorders can be life threatening and require emergency treatment--surgery, in many cases. Abdominal pain, often severe, usually accompanies these gastrointestinal emergencies. If a person is experiencing abdominal pain, a doctor must decide if there is a need for immediate surgery to both identify and treat the problem or whether surgery can wait until diagnostic test results are available. Emergency surgery of the abdomen is often performed when the abdominal pain seems to result from an intestinal obstruction; a ruptured organ, such as the gallbladder, appendix, or intestine; or an abscess (a pus-filled pocket of infection).
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