[Do all patients with mandibular hypoplasia present difficulty in endotracheal intubation?]

On 7 patients with Pierre-Robin syndrome (PR), 8 patients with first and second brachial arch syndrome (BA) and 7 patients with Treacher Collins syndrome (TC), we examined retrospectively the number of patients whom anesthesiologists found difficult to perform laryngoscopy and intubation, the number of attempt necessary for proper insertion of the tracheal tube, the number of patients in whom the endotracheal intubation with laryngoscopy was given up and the time necessary for endotracheal intubation. We compared these with those from 22 control patients. Our results suggest that the difficult laryngoscopy and intubation are more frequent in TC. On the other hand, most of PR and BA may not present difficulty in intubation.