Airway devices in paediatric anaesthesia

Abstract

Airway devices were first used in children since 1940 and thereafter an increasingly large number of paediatric airway devices have come into our armamentarium. To control and protect the airway in children during anaesthesia, in intensive care unit or in emergency department either tracheal intubation is performed under direct or indirect visualization of vocal cords with the help of laryngoscopes or video-laryngoscopes respectively or it can be done blindly or by using special instruments such as fiberoptic laryngoscope, lighted stylet or Bullard laryngoscope to name a few. Airway also can be maintained with the help of Laryngeal mask airways, oropharyngeal and nasopharyngeal airways. Updating our information and knowledge regarding these developments is pivotal to our practice of paediatric anaesthesia. With a thorough search of books, MEDLINE, MEDNET, clinical trials.gov.in, this article aims at focusing and understanding a brief basis of paediatric devices and their use.

Keywords: Airway devices; endotracheal tubes; fiberoptic bronchoscope; paediatric; supraglottic devices; video-laryngoscope.