Children with mediastinal masses can have a variety of disparate clinical presentations, including chest pain, superior vena cava syndrome, Horner syndrome, pericardial effusion, and cardiac tamponade. Nonetheless, respiratory symptoms are present in 80% of children at presentation and are the most common presenting symptom. Management of respiratory failure due to mediastinal masses is challenging because intubation-with the accompanying sedation and paralysis-is likely to worsen the respiratory failure. For this reason, any new treatments for this condition are welcome. We report the case of an intubated 2-year-old girl with respiratory failure from a mediastinal mass who was successfully weaned from mechanical ventilatory support through the use of a 70%:30% helium-oxygen admixture (heliox). We then review mediastinal masses and the biophysical rationale for use of heliox in airway narrowing.

Download full-text PDF

Source
http://dx.doi.org/10.1097/PEC.0b013e3181aba7deDOI Listing

Publication Analysis

Top Keywords

mediastinal masses
12
respiratory failure
12
failure mediastinal
8
therapeutic application
4
application helium-oxygen
4
helium-oxygen mechanical
4
mechanical ventilation
4
ventilation child
4
child acute
4
acute myelogenous
4

Similar Publications

Want AI Summaries of new PubMed Abstracts delivered to your In-box?

Enter search terms and have AI summaries delivered each week - change queries or unsubscribe any time!