Tracheostomy is an important procedure in children requiring prolonged mechanical ventilation. We conducted a retrospective study to assess the frequency, indications, postoperative course and short-term outcome of elective tracheostomy in a Paediatric Intensive Care Unit (PICU) of Pakistan. Twenty-five patients underwent tracheostomy in last 5 years (2.2 % of all PICU admissions). Mean age of ...

Tracheostomy is a common procedure for intensive care patients requiring prolonged mechanical ventilation. In this case report, we describe a 78-year-old female patient admitted for an aneurysm of the cerebral anterior communicating artery. Following immediate endovascular coiling, she remained ventilated and was transferred to the neurological intensive care unit. On postoperative day ten, a p...

BACKGROUND Ear, nose, and throat (ENT) surgeons perform the majority of surgical tracheostomies. Intensive care anaesthetists are increasingly performing bedside percutaneous tracheostomy. The objectives of this study were to characterize emergency complications of tracheostomy and to ascertain healthcare professionals' knowledge of life-saving strategies for the patient with a tracheostomy. ...

Recent papers discussed include a positive trial of early tracheostomy, two negative studies of targeted noninvasive ventilation, the long awaited results of the high versus low positive endexpiratory pressure Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome Clinical Trial Network trial and a simple but illuminating study into prognostic markers and end-points of resucitation.

An 18-yr-old man with insulin-dependent diabetes developed severe subglottic stenosis after a very brief period of intubation. Emergency tracheostomy was complicated by the development of bilateral pneumothoraces. This case highlights the importance of making an early diagnosis to minimize the risk of complications and examines postintubation subglottic stenosis in the context of poorly control...

INTRODUCTION Previous reports have demonstrated that prior cardiac surgery is independently associated with in-hospital mortality after infant tracheostomy. We aimed to determine whether these infants would continue to be at increased risk for death following hospital discharge. METHODS A retrospective review was performed on subjects < 2 y of age who recovered from tracheostomy in the pediat...

OBJECTIVE To determine the effects of tracheostomy on respiratory mechanics and work of breathing (WOB). DESIGN A before-and-after trial of 20 patients undergoing tracheostomy for repeated extubation failure. SETTING Surgical intensive care unit at a university teaching hospital and a level I trauma center. PATIENTS A consecutive sample of 20 patients who met extubation criteria (Pa(O2), ...

In the last few years numerous reports from intensive care units confirm that a nonsurgical percutaneous tracheostomy has successfully replaced elective conventional (surgical) tracheostomy. The majority of authors point out the advantages over surgical technique such as: the speed of procedure, the possibility of doing it at bedside thus excluding transport and the need for operating theatre, ...

INTRODUCTION Following advances of Intensive Care medicine and widespread administration of mechanical ventilation, tracheostomy has become one of the indispensable surgical procedures. During this research we tried to assess and compare two main strategies for doing tracheostomy: Surgically Created Tracheostomy (SCT) and Percutaneous Dilatational Tracheostomy (PDT). METHODS In a randomized c...