Wang TT, Wang J, Sun TT, Hou YT, Lu Y, Chen SG. Perianesthesia emergency repair of a cut endotracheal tube’s inflatable tube: A case report. World J Clin Cases 2022; 10(14): 4594-4600 [PMID: 35663091 DOI: 10.12998/wjcc.v10.i14.4594]
Corresponding Author of This Article
Shan-Gui Chen, Chief Nurse, Department of Anesthesiology, The First Affiliated Hospital of Anhui Medical University, No. 218 Jixi Road, Hefei 230000, Anhui Province, China. chenshanguimz@163.com
Research Domain of This Article
Anesthesiology
Article-Type of This Article
Case Report
Open-Access Policy of This Article
This article is an open-access article which was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Ting-Ting Wang, Jiang Wang, Ting-Ting Sun, Yao Lu, Shan-Gui Chen, Department of Anesthesiology, The First Affiliated Hospital of Anhui Medical University, Hefei 230000, Anhui Province, China
Yu-Ting Hou, Department of Infectious Disease, The First Affiliated Hospital of Anhui Medical University, Hefei 230000, Anhui Province, China
Author contributions: Wang TT and Wang J designed this study and wrote the manuscript; Sun TT and Hou YT performed the literature research; Lu Y, and Chen SG revised the final manuscript; all the authors contributed to the final version of the manuscript.
Informed consent statement: Informed written consent was obtained from the patient for publication of this report and any accompanying images.
Conflict-of-interest statement: The authors declare that they have no conflicts of interest to disclose.
CARE Checklist (2016) statement: The authors have read the CARE Checklist (2016), and the manuscript was prepared and revised according to the CARE Checklist (2016).
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article that was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: https://creativecommons.org/Licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Corresponding author: Shan-Gui Chen, Chief Nurse, Department of Anesthesiology, The First Affiliated Hospital of Anhui Medical University, No. 218 Jixi Road, Hefei 230000, Anhui Province, China. chenshanguimz@163.com
Received: October 15, 2021 Peer-review started: October 15, 2021 First decision: January 11, 2022 Revised: January 20, 2022 Accepted: March 25, 2022 Article in press: March 25, 2022 Published online: May 16, 2022
Abstract
BACKGROUND
During the perianesthesia period, emergency situations threatening the life and safety of patients can occur at any time. When dealing with some emergencies, occasional confusion is inevitable.
CASE SUMMARY
This case report describes the rare situation wherein a surgeon inadvertently detached the inflatable tube of an endotracheal tube during a tonsillectomy, and positive pressure ventilation could not be provided. While reintubation may increase the risk of respiratory tract infection and aspiration, patients with a difficult airway might die due to apnea. The best treatment method is to optimize the damaged tracheal tube junction to avoid secondary intubation and ensure patient safety. An intravenous needle and cannula were used to repair the damaged gap in the current case. Following the repair, the anesthesia machine showed no indication of low tidal volume, and there was no deflation of the endotracheal tube cuff. Subsequently, the patient was transferred to the post-anesthesia recovery room, and the tracheal tube was removed with satisfactory results.
CONCLUSION
Using an intravenous needle to repair a break in the inflatable tube surrounding an endotracheal tube is safe and reliable.
Core Tip: We report a case of perianesthesia in which the trachea tube’s inflatable tube was damaged due to a surgical error, causing a ventilation disorder and triggering the anesthesia machine alarm suggesting low tidal volume. In case of an emergency, our team uses an intravenous catheter to quickly and effectively patch the inflatable tube temporarily to ensure smooth operation and patient safety.
