A 15-year-old boy was referred to our emergency department for evaluation of subcutaneous emphysema. The patient had presented with gradual onset of dull resting chest pain lasting for almost an hour. The nature of the pain subsequently changed to sharp and radiated to his throat. He had undergone a chest X-ray at the outside emergency department which was remarkable for subcutaneous emphysema....

Figure 1: (A) Chest radiography revealed a 1.5-cm radio-opaque density at the level of the T4-5 vertebrae. (B and C) Chest computed tomography demonstrated bilateral neck subcutaneous emphysema and pneumomediastinum with a tubular structure, 15 cm in length, in the cervical and upper thoracic oesophagus. (D) The upper posterior mediastinal pleura were opened, and a ballpoint pen was found betwe...

Difficult intubation can be found in 11% of emergency tracheal intubations.1 Predictors of difficult tracheal intubation have been described, such as mouth opening, Mallampati classification, atlanto-occipital joint extension, mandibulohyoid distance, inter-incisor distance, thyromental distance, sternomental distance, obesity, and a previous history of difficult intubation.2 The occurrence of ...

Congenital lobar emphysema is cause of infantile respiratory distress and diagnosed by lobar overaeration, mediastinal shift and/or compression of the adjacent lobe. However, concomitant congenital heart disease with this clinical condition is not uncommon, and there is no uniform consensus about the treatment strategy in these particular cases. We present a child who was treated with division ...

Methods Eleven patients (6 males and 5 females) were diagnosed and treated for iatrogenic tracheal rupture in our clinic. The laceration occurred after orotracheal intubation in 7 cases, and during percutaneous tracheostomy and emergency tracheostomy in the other 4 cases, respectively. Diagnosis was made during thoracic surgery in 5 cases. The remaining cases were diagnosed in the post-operativ...

Mediastinal liposarcoma (ML) is a rare mesenchymal tumor, accounting for less than 1% of mediastinal tumors. They have a slow growth, so they may not give symptoms for a long time, until the tumor produces compression of close structures. The treatment of choice is surgery, which can be combined with chemo-radiotherapy. We present a case in which the diagnosis of a ML was made in a 30-year-old ...