THE IMPACT OF TRACHEAL TUBE INTRODUCER GUIDED INTUBATION IN ANTICIPATED NON DIFFICULT AIRWAY ON POST OPERATIVE SORE THROAT

Postoperative sore throat (POST) is a longstanding common negative anesthesia outcome after general anesthesia (GA) wherein conventional direct laryngoscopy-intubation (DLI) technique is employed to control upper airway. Various reasons have been placed forth and corresponding measures undertaken (e.g. tracheal tube cuff pressure control) to preclude/diminish the impact of POST but in vain. Till date, none of the efforts to prevent POST have considered mechanical factors associated with DLI as a contributing factor of POST. Since the only ‘active’ mechanical event during upper airway management comprises DLI, we presume that modification of DLI technique will reduce the forces associated with the technique and consequently, bring down incidence/severity of POST. Tracheal tube introducers (TTI), introduced to facilitate intubation in difficult airway settings, have only been employed once to improve quality-of-DLI in non-difficult airway (NDA) settings, that too with limited success. We speculate that the forces related to DLI, including, 1. Laryngoscopic mandibular lift (to expose the glottis-opening), and 2. Frictional forces generated when a tracheal tube passes the vocal cords to get into the trachea; are likely to be lesser when a tracheal-tube is guided inside the trachea with the help of a TTI. This study intends to evaluate the use of TTI in NDA in terms of their ability to bring down the impact of active DLI forces during upper airway access, and consequently, on the incidence of POST.xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" /