Inflammation of an epiploic appendage is considered to be a rare cause of acute abdomen. Recently it has been reported that typical computed tomography (CT) findings of primary epiploic appendagitis (PEA) provide a definitive diagnosis in most of the cases. However since these papers are only few they are easily overlooked by the practicing radiologists. Our purpose is to add four new cases to the existing literature and to perform a review of the literature. (C) 2001 Elsevier Science Inc. All ...