2Department of Thoracic Surgery, School of Medicine, Cumhuriyet University, Sivas, Turkey DOI : 10.26663/cts.2019.00024 Viewed : 4449 - Downloaded : 1565 Background: Foreign body (FB) aspiration is a serious clinical situation due to its life-threatening status and especially common in the childhood period. We aimed to present the diagnosis and treatment of foreign bodies in pediatric age group.
Material and Methods: Files of 510 patients aged 16 years and below that underwent rigid bronchoscopy due to suspicion of FB aspiration between June 1994 and November 2017 were retrospectively reviewed. 263 cases were included to the study that underwent foreign body removal. The cases were assessed in terms of gender, age, type and localization of the foreign body, clinical complaint, radiological findings, treatment method, complication and mortality.
Results: Among the patients 45.6% were male and 54.4% were female. The aspirated foreign bodies varied from dried nuts to plastic, from hijab needles to beads. The most aspirated foreign body were dried nuts. 51% of them were removed from the right main bronchus, 31.9% from the left main bronchus, and 17.1% from the trachea. 97.8% of the foreign bodies were removed via bronchoscope. Thoracotomy was performed in 6 cases since the foreign bodies were not extractable with a bronchoscope or due to developing complications. No mortality occurred.
Conclusions: FB aspiration can lead to life-threatening complications in children aged 3 years or below. Bronchoscopy should be performed in all cases of foreign body aspiration, including suspicious cases. Notably, the bronchoscopy procedure should be carried out by a well-trained, experienced anesthesiologist-endoscopy team and with appropriate tools.
Keywords : childhood period foreign body aspirations, trachea, bronchus