Medical Science
Volume 24, Issue 105, September - October, 2020
Causes and Clinical Presentation of Upper Airway Obstruction among Sudanese Children
Yaseen Mohammed Alameen1, Amar Fathi Mohamed Khalifa2♦
1Assistant Professor E.N.T Department, Alzaiem Alazhari University, Khartoum, Sudan; Email: yaseenalameen@gmail.com
2Assistant Professor Community Medicine, AlMaarefa University, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia; Email: ammarfathi22@gmail.com
♦Corresponding author
Dr. Amar Fathi Mohamed Khalifa, Assistant Professor Community Medicine AlMaarefa University, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, Email;
ammarfathi22@gmail.com / akhalifah@mcst.edu.sa
ABSTRACT
Background: Acute upper airway obstruction regardless of the cause can be a life- threatening emergency. Complete obstruction will
lead to respiratory failure followed by cardiac arrest in minutes. In contrast, a child with partial obstruction may initially have an
adequate airway, which may be followed by recurrent chest infections or attacks of stridor. Objectives: To investigate the different
causes of upper airway obstruction among Sudanese. Patients and methods: This is a prospective observational hospital based study
conducted in ENT Khartoum Teaching Hospital from October 2017 to October 2018. 62 patients were included in the study. Data
were collected from the patients and their guardians using pre coded pretested questionnaire developed specifically for this study
after consulting literature and epidemiologist. The data analyzed using SPSS software program and p value of 0.05 or less
considered significant. Results: The male: female ratio is 1.48: 1.00. The mean age of patients was found to be 2 years and 9 months,
with 87.1% of patients belonging to the age group 0- 5 years. The most common cause of obstruction was foreign body aspiration
(19.4%) followed by bilateral choanal atresia and laryngomalacia (14.5%) for each and croup in (9.7 %). At presentation; all patients
(100%) were dyspnoeic and distressed, 85.5% of them had obvious stridor while the remaining (14.5%) presented with cyanosis.
Conclusion: upper airway obstruction in children affects mostly younger children less than 5 years. The most common cause is
foreign body larynx aspiration. The most common presentation in this group is stridor.
Keywords: airway obstruction; partial obstruction; foreign body aspiration
Medical Science, 2020, 24(105), 3319-3323
