Alena Ľuptáková, Beata Sániová, Marta Kulichová, Stanislava Richterová, Milan Dragula, Julián Hamžík, Alexander Jurko, Marián Fedor, Slavomír Nosáľ
There has been a significant increase in the number of video-assisted thoracoscopic and thoracotomy surgery in paediatric population in the last decade. These procedures require special airway management and adequate preoperational and postoperational analgesia. We present a group of paediatric patients who underwent thoracic surgery because of atresia of oesophagus, tracheo-oesophageal fistula, congenital lobar emphysema, pulmonary cysts and abscesses, hyperhidrosis, lung biopsy and chest deformities. Patients were divided into thoracotomy and video-assisted thoracoscopic surgery subgroups. Ages, sex, type of anaesthesia and postoperational analgesia were taken into account. The effect of the postoperational epidural analgesia and postoperational pain management emphasizing the decrease of the incidence of postoperational complications were evaluated.