Anaesthesia and intensive care
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Anaesth Intensive Care · May 1991
Comparative StudyIntraoperative assessment of the Lawrence 3000 Doppler Cardiac Output Monitor.
Transoesophageal Doppler cardiac output measurement was evaluated against the thermodilution method in eleven patients undergoing elective cardiac surgery. A total of 106 pairs of Doppler and thermodilution values were obtained. Cardiac output was measured over a range of 2.3 l.min-1. to 11.51 l.min-1. ⋯ Standard deviction was 1.8 l.min-1. This is a significant difference. It is concluded that these techniques do not agree when measuring cardiac outputs.
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Anaesth Intensive Care · May 1991
Experience with the laryngeal mask airway in two hundred patients.
Observations were recorded from two hundred consecutive insertions of the laryngeal mask airway (LMA). They were undertaken by 27 anaesthetists most of whom had no previous experience of its use. A clinically patent airway was obtained in 94% of patients and in the majority of these (76%) the LMA was positioned correctly at the first attempt. ⋯ Success with the LMA was related to experience: anaesthetists who had used the LMA over 15 times had no failures in 67 insertions. Twenty-two patients coughed and six developed mild laryngospasm at insertion. The incidence of postoperative sore throat was 8%.
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An adaptor has been devised which, when fitted between the handle and the blade of a standard Macintosh design laryngoscope, allows the angle to be adjusted to several clinically useful positions. An appropriate angle can be easily found either for introduction of the blade, laryngoscopy or exploration of the pharynx through a simple mechanism operated by the hand holding the laryngoscope.