Awake endotracheal retrograde intubation in restricted mouth opening: a ‘J’-tipped guide wire technique—a retrospective study

Abstract

Airway management in patient with restricted mouth opening is a great challenge, owing to the difficulty in laryngoscopy and visualisation of the vocal cords during the procedure of intubation. The term retrograde intubation refers to a technique in which a guide wire is passed into the trachea and then into the mouth or nose. A tracheal tube is then passed down over the guide until it enters the trachea. A retrospective audit was undertaken to determine the success and complication associated with retrograde intubation. The results show that in a sample of 20 patients in which retrograde intubation was done, only three developed sore throat and cough, one had bronchospasm and one developed infection at the site of insertion of a J-tipped catheter. Retrograde tracheal intubation was easy to perform and had a high success rate and a low incidence of complications.