Acute upper airway obstruction

Acute upper airway obstruction continues to challenge medical practitioners who care for children. Whilst usually straightforward, management can be complicated by incorrect diagnosis, unexpected deterioration, difficulty in assessing the need for intubation, difficulty in providing optimal intubation skills and confusion over the value of various therapies.The highest priority is preventing death or hypoxic injury in those few children who progress to profound obstruction.In this overview, the term laryngotracheitis is used as a synonym for croup and laryngotracheobronchitis, epiglottitis is used as a synonym for supraglottitis, and bacterial tracheitis is used as a synonym for pseudomembranous croup. The term ‘intubation’ is used as an abbreviation for mechanical relief of airway obstruction.