Palpation of AAA appears to be safe and has not been reported to precipitate rupture. The best evidence on the accuracy of abdominal palpation comes from 15 studies of patients not previously known to have AAA who were screened with both abdominal palpation and ultrasound.
Limited data suggest that abdominal obesity decreases the sensitivity of palpation.
Abdominal palpation specifically directed at measuring aortic width has moderate sensitivity for detecting an AAA that would be large enough to be referred for surgery but cannot be relied on to exclude AAA, especially if rupture is a possibility. The authors thank Andreas Laupacis, MD, and Kavita Nanda, MD, for their helpful reviews of the article. All rights reserved.