Although standard management of an expected difficult intubation is based on fibre-optic techniques, the application of optical laryngoscopes such as Airtraq is gaining widespread acceptance. We here describe a case where an intubation attempt with the Airtraq laryngoscope was not only unsuccessful, but negatively influenced subsequent use of a flexible fibroscopic approach.

OBJECTIVE Training students on simulators before allowing their direct contact with patients is well accepted. There is no clinical or manikin-based simulation study in the literature comparing tracheal intubation with Airtraq, laryngeal mask airway (LMA) CTrach and Macintosh laryngoscopes performed by medical students having no prior intubation experience. METHODS After obtaining written inf...

Background: Difficult intubation, represent a challenge to anesthetist especially that many cases are encountered after induction of anesthesia. The Airtraq and the Bonfils fibroscopes are new devices designed to facilitate intubation under normal and difficult circumstances. In the present study, the efficacy and the intubation success rate of the Airtraq to the Bonfils fiberscope were evaluat...

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES Lipoma is a progressively increasing disease which may appear anywhere in the body. Its appearance at the back of the neck, especially when it is large enough to cause restriction of neck extension, poses challenges to anesthesiologists in airway management whenever needed. This paper evaluates the role of Airtraq® in restricted neck movement. CASE REPORT Case with a...

The leading cause of anesthesia-related injury is the inability to intubate the trachea and secure the airway.1 Improvements in video and optical laryngoscopy have allowed to obtain an indirect view of the glottis in a more simple way but sometimes this advantage occurs together with a difficult or impossible endotracheal tube (ETT) insertion.2 This is because indirect techniques do not require...

Difficult or unsuccesful tracheal intubation is one of the important causes for morbidity and mortality in susceptible patients. Almost 30% of the anesthesia-related deaths are induced by the complications of difficult airway management and more than 85% of all respiratory related complications cause brain injury or death. Nowadays, due to the advances in technology, new videolaryngoscopic devi...

Conventional laryngoscopy with the Macintosh Laryngoscope has been the gold standard for tracheal intubation since 1940s.1 Failed attempts to intubate the trachea and secure airway, both in the operating room and outside, still remains a cause of anesthesia-related mortality and morbidity.2-5 Investigation is, therefore, in progress to find the best methods and/or equipment to augment the succe...

been two manikin studies that have described its performance. The device was evaluated in normal and simulated difficult airways. Until now, there have been no descriptions of its use in live subjects. We describe two patients in whom the Airtraq, compared with the Macintosh blade, provided superior views of the larynx facilitating endotracheal intubation. The first case was an anxious 59-yr-ol...

OBJECTIVE Several devices can aid nasotracheal intubation when managing difficult airways. The McGrath MAC and Airtraq NT were compared with a Macintosh laryngoscope when studying the performance of anaesthetists with different levels of experience, in a manikin model of easy or difficult airway scenarios. METHODS Sixty-three anaesthetists were recruited into a randomised trial in which each ...