[Analysis of tracheostomies in a pediatric intensive care unit during the period 2003-2013]

Tracheotomy in pediatric patients is a rare procedure. In this pediatric series, perioperative complications, mortality related to surgical procedure and overall mortality are analyzed.

This is a retrospective study conducted from January 2003 to December 2013. Data were retrieved from patients who were tracheotomized and admitted to our PICU in the postoperative period.

Data were collected from 25 tracheotomized patients admitted during the study period. The mean age was 3.3 months (median 14 months, range 1-144 months), and PICU length of stay was 53 days (median 37 days, range 1-338 days). Most patients (68%) had comorbidities before their admission, with a higher prevalene of craniofacial anomalies/polymalformative syndromes (32%) and prematurity related disorders (12%) being obserevd. The most common etiologies related to the procedure were congenital airway obstruction (16%) and several types of spinal cord injury (16%), followed by tracheobronchomalacia (12%) and subglottic stenosis (12%). Some kind of complication was detected in 40% of patients, with accidental decannulation being the most frequent. Accidental or unexpected decannulation was present in a percentage as high as 20% of our patients, mainly in the first 24 hours after surgery. One of the patients died as a result of this.

The postoperative course of a tracheotomy is associated with a high rate of complications, some of them related to life-threatening events.