Prevalence of incidental findings requiring interventions in CT for trauma patients in the emergency department: a systematic review and meta-analysis

Objective To systematically review and meta-analyse the prevalence of incidental findings (IFs) requiring interventions identified in CT performed for patients with traumatic injuries in the emergency department, including pathologically confirmed cancers and emergent non-traumatic vascular pathologies. Design Systematic review and meta-analysis. Data sources PubMed, EMBASE and Cochrane CENTRAL databases from database inception to 22 November 2024. Eligibility criteria for selecting studies Prospective or retrospective studies involving traumatic injury patients presented at the emergency department reporting IFs of clinical significance detected through CT with any interventions proposed were included. Studies that exclusively included paediatric populations were excluded. The systematic review methods included double-screening, dual assessment of eligibility and study validity, dual data extraction, Bayesian multivariate random-effects meta-analysis of prevalence and employing the Grading of Recommendations, Assessment, Development and Evaluations’ rating for the certainty of evidence. The primary outcomes were IFs requiring any interventions, and subset IFs requiring urgent interventions. Secondary outcomes were histologically confirmed cancers and emergent non-traumatic vascular pathologies. Results 22 studies (1 with a prospective and 21 with a retrospective design) mainly from high-income countries using limited-quality data based on clinical practice involving 18 538 patients were included. 9 studies evaluated the whole body, while 13 evaluated selective body regions. The grading criteria for IFs were non-uniform, and the image interpreters involved had diverse experience and expertise. The summary prevalence estimates for IFs requiring any interventions, urgent interventions, pathologically confirmed cancers and emergent non-traumatic vascular pathologies detected in the whole body were 29.8% (95% credible interval (CrI) 20.4% to 42.9%; very low certainty), 7.6% (95% CrI 4.5% to 14.8%; low certainty), 0.6% (95% CrI 0.3% to 1.6%; moderate certainty) and 0.3% (95% CrI 0.1% to 0.9%; moderate certainty), respectively. These findings were largely identified in the chest or abdomen and pelvis, with the overall detection frequency reduced with the scanned body regions narrowed (very low to moderate certainty). Sparse data on the head, neck and spine resulted in limited results. Conclusions IFs identified in trauma whole-body CT requiring intervention are prevalent and can lead to substantial medical costs. The widely reported prevalence range suggests variations in radiologist recommendations and reporting in clinical practice and calls for standardisations. IFs requiring urgent intervention are not rare, which leads to a diagnosis of significant diseases including cancers and urgent vascular pathologies. Future studies should report long-term, patient-relevant results based on standardised classification and reporting systems. PROSPERO registration number CRD42020187852.