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Abstract The paediatric respiratory system undergoes multiple important developmental changes throughout infancy and childhood. The upper airway changes dramatically as children grow and develop. These considerations underscore potentially devastating consequences of airway compromise in children, particularly infants. Decreased airway caliber in young patients, as with mucosal thickening or bronchospasm, causes proportionally greater decrease in airway radius than in older patients, with markedly increased airway resistance. Regarding airway injuries during intubation in the paediatric age group, it is clear that if the airway lumen is not 50% narrowed, ulcers, mucosal abrasions, and penetrating lesions on various anatomical levels (glottic, subglottic, and tracheal) do not result in stridor. Stridor is unable to distinguish between injuries requiring prompt surgical intervention and benign injuries (temporary edema). Despite more than 100 years of intubation during surgery, laryngeal evaluations are frequently delayed and only performed if symptoms last longer than or equal to one week after extubation. Additionally, there is no established standard best practice for assessing laryngeal injury, dysphonia, or dysphagia after extubation. Flexible endoscopic airway examination demonstrated similar reliability to 4D- computed tomography examination of the upper airway. The aim of this study was to detect the early airway changes after using cuffed or uncuffed ETT in paediatrics and to find out the correlation of endoscopic and ultrasound findings in detection of post-intubation sequelae in paediatrics. |