[Dyspnoea after complication-free tracheostomy]

A 70-year-old woman had been under oncological supervision for several years because of breast cancer with bone and lymph node metastases. For several weeks she had been treated for increasing vocal cord paresis of uncertain cause, requiring a tracheostomy, a speech cannula being inserted after eight days. Several days later the patient began to complain of dyspnea, but repeated inspection and cleaning of the cannula failed to reveal its cause. The increasingly anxious patient was given a benzodiazepine preparation to calm her. She was then transferred to the intensive care unit because of worsening respiratory insufficiency and impaired consciousness.

A fiberoptic bronchoscopy was performed immediately, which revealed a black foreign body immediately distal to the tip of the tracheal cannula. The cannula was removed and the slightly sedated patient at once coughed up a large amount of bronchial secretion and a long, curved and fairly firm blood clot. Control bronchoscopy now revealed a flat, slightly hemorrhagic ulcer on the dorsal tracheal wall at the point where the cannula tip had made contact with the tracheal wall.

Even trained personnel may have difficulty in recognizing intratracheal thrombi in patients with a tracheostomy. It is thus essential that an endoscopy is performed in patients with obstructive symptoms after a tracheostomy.