<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<!DOCTYPE article PUBLIC "-//NLM//DTD JATS (Z39.96) Journal Publishing DTD v1.2 20190208//EN" "https://jats.nlm.nih.gov/publishing/1.2/JATS-journalpublishing1.dtd">
<article xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink" xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" article-type="research-article" dtd-version="1.2" xml:lang="en">
<front>
<journal-meta>
<journal-id journal-id-type="publisher-id">IJMABHR</journal-id>
<journal-title-group><journal-title>International Journal of Medical and All Body Health Research</journal-title><abbrev-journal-title>IJMABHR</abbrev-journal-title></journal-title-group>
<issn pub-type="epub">2582-8940</issn>
<publisher><publisher-name>Anfo Publication House</publisher-name></publisher>
</journal-meta>
<article-meta>
<article-id pub-id-type="publisher-id">337</article-id>
<article-id pub-id-type="doi">10.54660/IJMBHR.2025.6.2.71-76</article-id>
<title-group><article-title>Comparative Diagnostic Performance of RIPASA, ALVARADO, and AIR Scoring Systems in Acute Appendicitis: A Retrospective Evaluation Using Traditional Metrics and XGBoost Algorithm</article-title></title-group>
<contrib-group>
<contrib contrib-type="author" corresp="yes"><name><surname>Kucukakcali</surname><given-names>Zeynep</given-names></name><xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff1"/></contrib>
<contrib contrib-type="author"><name><surname>Cicek</surname><given-names>Ipek Balikci</given-names></name><xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff1"/></contrib>
<aff id="aff1"><label>1</label>Department of Biostatistics and Medical Informatics, Inonu University Faculty of Medicine, 44280, Malatya, Turkey</aff>
</contrib-group>
<pub-date publication-format="electronic" date-type="pub"><year>2025</year></pub-date>
<volume>6</volume>
<issue>2</issue>
<fpage>71</fpage>
<lpage>76</lpage>
<history>
<date date-type="received"><day>11</day><month>03</month><year>2025</year></date>
<date date-type="accepted"><day>15</day><month>04</month><year>2025</year></date>
</history>
<permissions><license license-type="open-access" xlink:href="https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/?utm"><license-p>CC BY-NC-SA 4.0</license-p></license></permissions>
<self-uri xlink:href="https://www.allmedicaljournal.com/article/337/comparative-diagnostic-performance-of-ripasa-alvarado-and-air-scoring-systems-in-acute-appendicitis"/>
<self-uri content-type="pdf" xlink:href="https://www.allmedicaljournal.com/article/337/download"/>
<abstract><p>Aim: This study aimed to evaluate the diagnostic performance of three clinical scoring systems—RIPASA, ALVARADO, and AIR—in identifying acute appendicitis. By comparing these methods against histopathological findings, the gold standard for diagnosis, the study further explored whether machine learning integration via the XGBoost algorithm could enhance classification accuracy.
Material and Methods: A publicly available retrospective dataset containing records of 107 patients, including their RIPASA, ALVARADO, AIR scores, and histopathological diagnoses, was analyzed. Diagnostic performance metrics (accuracy, sensitivity, specificity, PPV, NPV, balanced accuracy) were computed for each scoring system. Additionally, an XGBoost classification model was constructed using the three scores as input variables to predict histopathological outcomes. Five-fold cross-validation and grid search optimization were applied to prevent overfitting and enhance generalizability.
Results: RIPASA and AIR scores outperformed the ALVARADO score in both accuracy and sensitivity, with RIPASA demonstrating the most balanced diagnostic profile (accuracy: 86.0%, sensitivity: 87.8%, specificity: 76.5%). AIR achieved the highest sensitivity (97.8%) but had low specificity (29.4%). When combined with XGBoost, the AIR-based model achieved the best overall performance (accuracy: 96.0%, specificity: 100.0%, sensitivity: 90.9%, NPV: 93.3%). 
Conclusion: The RIPASA and AIR scoring systems demonstrate superior diagnostic capabilities compared to ALVARADO, particularly when combined with machine learning approaches like XGBoost. The integration of scoring systems with data-driven models holds promise for enhancing diagnostic accuracy and developing robust clinical decision support tools in emergency settings.</p></abstract>
<kwd-group kwd-group-type="author"><kwd>Acute appendicitis</kwd><kwd>RIPASA score</kwd><kwd>ALVARADO score</kwd><kwd>AIR score</kwd><kwd>XGBoost</kwd></kwd-group>
</article-meta>
</front>
<back><ref-list><title>References</title>
<ref id="R1"><label>1</label><mixed-citation>Köksal M, Şam AD, Köksal F, Özdemir Hİ, Çelikbaş B, Özcan BG. The comparison of histopathological diagnosis and preoperative ultrasonography and WBC results of cases operated on with a prediagnosis of childhood acute appendicitis. Turkish Journal of Pediatric Disease. 2015. [DOI: 10.12956/tjpd.2015.122]</mixed-citation></ref>
<ref id="R2"><label>2</label><mixed-citation>Di Saverio S, Birindelli A, Kelly MD, Catena F, Weber DG, Sartelli M, et al. WSES Jerusalem guidelines for diagnosis and treatment of acute appendicitis. World Journal of Emergency Surgery. 2016;11:34. [PMID: 27437029 PMCID: PMC4949879 DOI: 10.1186/s13017-016-0090-5]</mixed-citation></ref>
<ref id="R3"><label>3</label><mixed-citation>Bhangu A, Søreide K, Di Saverio S, Assarsson JH, Drake FT. Acute appendicitis: modern understanding of pathogenesis, diagnosis, and management. Lancet (London, England). 2015;386(10000):1278-1287. [PMID: 26460662 DOI: 10.1016/s0140-6736(15)00275-5]</mixed-citation></ref>
<ref id="R4"><label>4</label><mixed-citation>Peksöz R, Albayrak Y, Şebin E, Dişçi E, Aşkın S, Baştürk İ. Akut apandisit hastalarında ghrelin hormon düzeyi bakılması ve ghrelin hormon düzeyinin c-reaktif protein ve beyaz kan hücre düzeyleri ile karşılaştırılması. Genel Tıp Dergisi. 2021;31(3):252-256. [DOI: 10.54005/geneltip.996787]</mixed-citation></ref>
<ref id="R5"><label>5</label><mixed-citation>Chong CF, Adi MI, Thien A, Suyoi A, Mackie AJ, Tin AS, et al. Development of the RIPASA score: a new appendicitis scoring system for the diagnosis of acute appendicitis. Singapore Medical Journal. 2010;51(3):220-225. [PMID: 20428744]</mixed-citation></ref>
<ref id="R6"><label>6</label><mixed-citation>Akgül N, Gündeş E. Neutrophil/lymphocyte ratio in acute appendicitis: a state hospital experience. Turkish Journal of Colorectal Disease. 2016;26(4):121-124. [DOI: 10.4274/tjcd.42243]</mixed-citation></ref>
<ref id="R7"><label>7</label><mixed-citation>Ohle R, O&apos;Reilly F, O&apos;Brien KK, Fahey T, Dimitrov BD. The Alvarado score for predicting acute appendicitis: a systematic review. BMC Medicine. 2011;9:139. [PMID: 22204638 PMCID: PMC3299622 DOI: 10.1186/1741-7015-9-139]</mixed-citation></ref>
<ref id="R8"><label>8</label><mixed-citation>Dıkıcıer E, Altıntoprak F, Çakmak G, Akbulut G. The use of ultrasound imaging for acute appendicitis. Sakarya Medical Journal. 2011;1(2):64-66. [DOI: 10.5505/sakaryamj.2011.32032]</mixed-citation></ref>
<ref id="R9"><label>9</label><mixed-citation>Andersson RE, Hugander A, Thulin AJ. Diagnostic accuracy and perforation rate in appendicitis: association with age and sex of the patient and with appendicectomy rate. The European Journal of Surgery = Acta Chirurgica. 1992;158(1):37-41. [PMID: 1348639]</mixed-citation></ref>
<ref id="R10"><label>10</label><mixed-citation>Rezak A, Abbas HM, Ajemian MS, Dudrick SJ, Kwasnik EM. Decreased use of computed tomography with a modified clinical scoring system in diagnosis of pediatric acute appendicitis. Archives of Surgery. 2011;146(1):64-67.</mixed-citation></ref>
<ref id="R11"><label>11</label><mixed-citation>Chen T, Guestrin C. XGBoost: A scalable tree boosting system. Proceedings of the 22nd ACM SIGKDD International Conference on Knowledge Discovery and Data Mining. 2016:785-794.</mixed-citation></ref>
<ref id="R12"><label>12</label><mixed-citation>Snyder MJ, Guthrie M, Cagle S. Acute appendicitis: efficient diagnosis and management. American Family Physician. 2018;98(1):25-33. [PMID: 30215950]</mixed-citation></ref>
<ref id="R13"><label>13</label><mixed-citation>Petroianu A. Diagnosis of acute appendicitis. International Journal of Surgery. 2012;10(3):115-119.</mixed-citation></ref>
<ref id="R14"><label>14</label><mixed-citation>Butt MQ, Chatha SS, Ghumman AQ, Farooq M. RIPASA score: a new diagnostic score for diagnosis of International Journal of Medical and All Body Health Research www.allmedicaljournal.com acute appendicitis. Journal of the College of Physicians and Surgeons—Pakistan: JCPSP. 2014;24(12):894-897. [PMID: 25523723]</mixed-citation></ref>
<ref id="R15"><label>15</label><mixed-citation>Aman T, Yaqoob L, Shah SA, Arif NS, Shaheen H, Shah M, et al. Evaluation of RIPASA score for diagnosis of acute appendicitis. KJMS. 2018;11(2):189.</mixed-citation></ref>
<ref id="R16"><label>16</label><mixed-citation>Karami MY, Niakan H, Zadebagheri N, Mardani P, Shayan Z, Deilami I. Which one is better? Comparison of the acute inflammatory response, Raja Isteri Pengiran Anak Saleha appendicitis and Alvarado scoring systems. Annals of Coloproctology. 2017;33(6):227-231. [PMID: 29354605 PMCID: PMC5768477 DOI: 10.3393/ac.2017.33.6.227]</mixed-citation></ref>
<ref id="R17"><label>17</label><mixed-citation>Kollár D, McCartan D, Bourke M, Cross K, Dowdall J. Predicting acute appendicitis? A comparison of the Alvarado score, the appendicitis inflammatory response score and clinical assessment. World Journal of Surgery. 2015;39(1):104-109.</mixed-citation></ref>
<ref id="R18"><label>18</label><mixed-citation>Andersson M, Andersson RE. The appendicitis inflammatory response score: a tool for the diagnosis of acute appendicitis that outperforms the Alvarado score. World Journal of Surgery. 2008;32(8):1843-1849. [PMID: 18553045 DOI: 10.1007/s00268-008-9649-y]</mixed-citation></ref>
<ref id="R19"><label>19</label><mixed-citation>Deo RC. Machine learning in medicine. Circulation. 2015;132(20):1920-1930. [PMID: 26572668 PMCID: PMC5831252 DOI: 10.1161/circulationaha.115.001593]</mixed-citation></ref>
<ref id="R20"><label>20</label><mixed-citation>Rajpurkar P, Irvin J, Zhu K, Yang B, Mehta H, Duan T, et al. ChexNet: Radiologist-level pneumonia detection on chest x-rays with deep learning. arXiv Preprint arXiv:171105225. 2017.</mixed-citation></ref>
<ref id="R21"><label>21</label><mixed-citation>Handelman GS, Kok HK, Chandra RV, Razavi AH, Lee MJ, Asadi H. eDoctor: machine learning and the future of medicine. Journal of Internal Medicine. 2018;284(6):603-619.</mixed-citation></ref>
</ref-list></back>
</article>