Abstract
Endotracheal intubation is most commonly performed under general anaesthesia (GA). However, when the safety is threatened by induction of GA, awake intubation under airway anesthesia, with or without sedation is considered. Awake tracheal intubation has a good safety profile due to preservation of spontaneous ventilation and intrinsic airway muscle tone but can still fail in 1–2% of patients. Fatal complications like complete loss of airway and myocardial infarction have also been reported. In an awake patient, good local anesthesia (LA) will produce minimal discomfort during airway manipulation and helps to minimize local and systemic effects such as coughing, bucking, laryngospasm, bronchospasm, tachycardia, and hypertension. Successful local anaesthesia dependent on understanding of the rationale, selection of drugs, preparation of patient, execution of the appropriate technique and monitoring. Different aspects of airway anaesthesia are discussed in this chapter.
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Kumar, A., Anup, N.R. (2023). Airway Anesthesia. In: Ubaradka, R.S., Gupta, N., Bidkar, P.U., Tripathy, D.K., Gupta, A. (eds) The Airway Manual. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-19-4747-6_24
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-19-4747-6_24
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