Recent developments in airway management

Abstract

Most airway management in anaesthesia is safe, but infrequent disasters still occur and these were brought into focus by the 4th National Audit Project (NAP4) of the Royal College of Anaesthetists and Difficult Airway Society (DAS) ( Cook et al, 2011a ). Advances in airway management have included continued development of new devices in the last few years. Second-generation supraglottic airway devices, videolaryngoscopes and equipment for emergency surgical airway are the most notable. The complications associated with the use of some devices (e.g. airway exchange catheters) have been brought into focus. Safe airway management has also been supported by an increasing understanding of the human factors involved in successful, and unsuccessful, airway management and by the introduction of guidelines (particularly those of the Difficult Airway Society). This article reviews all these topics and other recent advances.