Pelvic Inflammatory Disease (PID) 1996 Case Definition

NOTE: A surveillance case definition is a set of uniform criteria used to define a disease for public health surveillance. Surveillance case definitions enable public health officials to classify and count cases consistently across reporting jurisdictions. Surveillance case definitions are not intended to be used by healthcare providers for making a clinical diagnosis or determining how to meet an individual patient’s health needs.

Clinical Description

A clinical syndrome resulting from the ascending spread of microorganisms from the vagina and endocervix to the endometrium, fallopian tubes, and/or contiguous structures. In a female who has lower abdominal pain and who has not been diagnosed as having an established cause other than pelvic inflammatory disease (PID) (e.g., ectopic pregnancy, acute appendicitis, and functional pain), all the following clinical criteria must be present:

Lower abdominal tenderness, AND
Tenderness with motion of the cervix, AND
Adnexal tenderness

In addition to the preceding criteria, at least one of the following findings must also be present:

Meets the surveillance case definition of C. trachomatis infection or gonorrhea
Temperature greater than 100.4°F (greater than 38.0°C)
Leukocytosis greater than 10,000 white blood cells/mm³
Purulent material in the peritoneal cavity obtained by culdocentesis or laparoscopy
Pelvic abscess or inflammatory complex detected by bimanual examination or by sonography
Patient is a sexual contact of a person known to have gonorrhea, chlamydia, or Nongonococcal urethritis

Case Classification

Confirmed

A case that meets the clinical case definition

Comments

For reporting purposes, a clinician's report of PID should be counted as a case.

Related Case Definition(s)

Pelvic Inflammatory Disease (PID) | 1990 Case Definition

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Last Reviewed: April 16, 2021

Source: Office of Public Health Data, Surveillance, and Technology