Measurement of Spleen to Left Kidney Ratio among Saudi School Age Children Using Ultrasonography

Abstract

Clinical determination of mild splenomegaly is extremely inaccurateas the spleen length varying according to many factors such as individual height, age and weight. The objective of this study was to determine sonographically the spleen to left kidney ratio according to age among school age children in Saudi Arabia. A cross sectional study and convenience sampling were done on 50 apparently healthy subjects (22 boys and 28 girls) aged 7 - 17 years at the Taawon clinicin Kharj city, Saudi Arabia. The sonographic examination was performed on Siemens (Acuson X300) machine with 3.5 and 5 MHz convex transducers. Spleen and left kidney lengths were obtained using appropriate techniques. The weight and height of the subjects were obtained with the participants wearing light weight clothes without shoes. The result of the study showed that the spleen and left kidney lengths were not statistically different in boys and girls (p > 0.05). The spleen to left kidney ratio according to age andhightis constant at about 1.1 with 1.3 as the upper limit of normal in the studied population. Spleen to left kidney length ratio becomesa promising method to detect non palpable splenic enlargement. Mild splenomegaly is considered if the spleen to left kidney ratio is greater than 1.3 in the absence of renal disease among school age children