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Modern Bronchial Blockers in Thoracic Surgery

  • Thoracic Anesthesia (T Schilling, Section Editor)
  • Published:
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Abstract

Modern thoracic surgery with its emerging focus on minimally invasive techniques requires intraoperative one-lung ventilation to achieve optimal surgical exposure. The double-lumen tube has been considered to be the golden standard for almost 60 years; however, new indications and surgical techniques in thoracic, cardiac, esophageal and ventral spine surgery, as well as scheduling of formerly inoperable patients have made the use of double-lumen tubes unfeasible in some cases and not preferable in many. Modern bronchial blockers like the VivaSight endobronchial blocker or the Fuji Uniblocker have the potential to succeed the double-lumen tube. Their characteristics in daily practice will be discussed in the present article. The most exciting development is the integration of camera lenses in both single- and double-lumen tubes for endotracheal placement without additional bronchoscopy.

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Correspondence to Thomas Schilling.

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This article is part of the Topical Collection on Thoracic Anesthesia.

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Kreft, T., Zardo, P., Busk, H. et al. Modern Bronchial Blockers in Thoracic Surgery. Curr Anesthesiol Rep 6, 103–110 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s40140-016-0162-9

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s40140-016-0162-9

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