Laryngospasm

In medicine, laryngospasm is an uncontrolled/involuntary muscular contraction (spasm) of the laryngeal cords. It is an well known, infrequent but serious post-surgery complication.

Etiology

It is associated with use of ketamine(an anesthetic).

Treatment

Laryngospasm is treated by administering oxygen. In more serious cases it may require intubationand ventilation. If orotracheal intubationis not possible a cricothyroidotomyis done to create an airway.

External links

• laryngospasm- gpnotebook.co.uk
• Ketamine: Emergency Applications(eMedicine.com) - discusses laryngospasm.

This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License.
It uses material from the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laryngospasm Wikipedia article Laryngospasm.