Dimensiones de la vía aérea en la población de Cuenca-Ecuador

Abstract

Objective: to describe the airway characteristics in a local population with the head in a neutral position, according to: distance between upper middle incisors to vocal cords, cricoid cartilage, carina and the point between the third and fourth tracheal ring, counted from the carina cephalad; vocal cords to carina, trachea, number of tracheal rings and correlate with height and sex.Methodology: it is a descriptive study in patients who were operated at the “Hospital de Especialidades José Carrasco Arteaga” and “Hospital Regional Vicente Corral Moscoso” during March 2019 to March 2020. Data were collected using a flexometer, stadiometer and flexible bronchoscope Ambu Scope 3 The data analysis was carried out in the IBM-SPSS 22.0 software with descriptive statistical measures and correlations.Results: a total of 151 patients were evaluated. The length of the middle incisors: at the carina was 23.32 ± (1.98) cm, at the cricoid 14.93 ± (1.38) cm, at the vocal cords 13.07 ± (1.36) cm, at the third or fourth tracheal ring counted from the carina towards cephalic 20.81 ± (2.03) cm; from the vocal cords to carina of 10.24 ± (1.45) cm; the trachea on average measured 8.40 ± (1.37) cm, with 13 tracheal rings.Conclusion: the airway measurements obtained are in agreement with the studies of ethnic groups similar to that of the study population, which indicates that extrapolating the data from the classic texts of Caucasian ethnicities can cause errors in daily practice such as endobronchial intubation or inadvertent extubation