Penetrating neck trauma in children: an urban hospital's experience

Management of Soft Tissue Injuries in Children-A Comprehensive Review

Airway injury, Ocular injury and neurovascular tissue damage, burns is all a spectrum of pediatric soft tissue injury complex. Soft tissue injuries to the head and neck area in children are challenging to manage, because these injuries significantly affect the child's overall health and development. Management of such injuries requires a multidisciplinary approach involving surgical and nonsurgical interventions and close collaboration among health care professionals, parents, and caregivers. This article reviews the various causes of injuries, specific considerations for each region of the head and neck, and approaches to the surgical management of soft tissue injuries in pediatric patients, including surgical and adjuvant therapies. Specific anatomic regions reviewed include the scalp/forehead, periorbital region, nose, cheeks, lips, ears, and neck/airway.Laceration repair in the growing pediatric populations may require revisions in the future. Facial soft tissue injuries are prone to poor cosmesis as in many occasions as may be constrained by available surgical specialists, thus proper multispecialty team approach along with surgical alignment and symmetry should be considered comprehensively.

Penetrating paediatric neck trauma

Penetrating injuries to the internal carotid artery are infrequent but potentially devastating and can be a significant challenge to the operating surgeon. In this article, we present a case of an 11-year-old girl who suffered a serious vascular injury when she fell on a pencil. We also discuss the most up-to-date recommendations concerning the management of zone II injuries to the neck of a paediatric patient.

Stab injury to the preauricular region with laceration of the external carotid artery without involvement of the facial nerve: a case report

Background

Open injuries to the face involving the external carotid artery are uncommon. These injuries are normally associated with laceration of the facial nerve because this nerve is more superficial than the external carotid artery. Hence, external carotid artery lesions are usually associated with facial nerve dysfunction. We present an unusual case report in which the patient had an injury to this artery with no facial nerve compromise.

Case presentation

A 25-year-old Portuguese man sustained a stab wound injury to his right preauricular region with a broken glass. Immediate profuse bleeding ensued. Provisory tamponade of the wound was achieved at the place of aggression by two off-duty doctors. He was initially transferred to a district hospital, where a large arterial bleeding was observed and a temporary compressive dressing was applied. Subsequently, the patient was transferred to a tertiary hospital. At admission in the emergency room, he presented a pulsating lesion in the right preauricular region and slight weakness in the territory of the inferior buccal branch of the facial nerve. The physical examination suggested an arterial lesion superficial to the facial nerve. However, in the operating theater, a section of the posterior and lateral flanks of the external carotid artery inside the parotid gland was identified. No lesion of the facial nerve was observed, and the external carotid artery was repaired. To better understand the anatomical rationale of this uncommon clinical case, we dissected the preauricular region of six cadavers previously injected with colored latex solutions in the vascular system. A small triangular space between the two main branches of division of the facial nerve in which the external carotid artery was not covered by the facial nerve was observed bilaterally in all cases.

Conclusions

This clinical case illustrates that, in a preauricular wound, the external carotid artery can be injured without facial nerve damage. However, no similar description was found in the reviewed literature, which suggests that this must be a very rare occurrence. According to the dissection study performed, this is due to the existence of a triangular space between the cervicofacial and temporofacial nerve trunks in which the external carotid artery is not covered by the facial nerve or its branches.

A case of penetrating neck trauma in a child

Penetrating injuries to the neck are potentially devastating, and recommendations concerning their evaluation have generated extensive discussion over the years. In this article, we present the case of a 9-year-old girl who narrowly missed a serious vascular injury when she fell on a pencil. We also discuss the most current recommendations concerning management of zone II injuries to the neck of a pediatric patient.

John M. Management and Outcomes of Laryngeal Injuries in the Pediatric Population

Objectives:

Pediatric laryngeal trauma is an uncommon event. The purpose of this study was to identify outcomes following surgical procedures for pediatric laryngeal trauma, and to provide an in-depth review of the literature.

Methods:

The National Trauma Data Bank was utilized to identify pediatric laryngeal trauma incidents with admission years 2002 through 2006. Patient demographics, injury type, surgical procedures, hospital and intensive care unit durations, ventilator duration, and discharge disposition were abstracted.

Results:

There were 69 laryngeal trauma incidents identified, with a median patient age of 12.8 years and an overall mortality rate of 8.7%. Laryngeal injury was frequently blunt-force in nature (82.8%) and often occurred in conjunction with trauma to multiple organ systems (76.8%). Tracheotomy (16 procedures), laryngeal suturing (13 procedures), and laryngeal fracture repair (10 procedures) were the most frequent procedures identified. Laryngeal fracture repair was noted to increase the overall hospital duration (p = 0.040). The communication scores were affected only by tracheotomy (p = 0.013). Surgical intervention did not significantly affect the frequency of home discharge.

Conclusions:

Pediatric laryngeal trauma is an uncommon event that can be evaluated with the National Trauma Data Bank. Although patients who undergo laryngeal fracture repair appear to have an increased duration of hospitalization, patients who undergo tracheotomy or laryngeal suturing do not have increased durations of ventilator dependence, stay in an intensive care unit, or hospitalization.

A penetrating neck injury: trivial trauma with serious consequences

Life-threatening complications due to apparently minor penetrating neck injuries can occur. We present the case of a 16-year-old boy, who had what initially appeared to be a superficial stab wound to his neck. After further evaluation, he was found to have major injuries to his larynx and esophagus. This case underscores the importance of a careful evaluation after any penetrating neck injury, even one that initially appears to be trivial. The pertinent literature regarding penetrating neck trauma is reviewed.

Adding Insult to Injury: Neck Exploration for Penetrating Pediatric Neck Trauma

Penetrating neck injuries are uncommon in children, and management involves mandatory exploration of the neck. This results in a number of unnecessary operations. Adult experience is moving towards selective exploration. A retrospective review was performed on all trauma patients presenting over the past 10 years. Pediatric patients with penetrating neck injury were selected and data were collected and analyzed. Out of a total of 19,363 trauma patients over the study period, we identified 39 children with 42 penetrating neck injuries. The average age was 13 years, and 56 per cent of cases were male. A large proportion (72%) was African-American. Over half of the injuries (63%) were from projectiles, including gun shot wounds (59%), which tended to be in the older children, whereas animal bites (5) were noted as a predominant cause in the younger ones. Six patients underwent exploration without any preoperative imaging due to penetration of the platysma, and four of these were nontherapeutic. Eighteen patients with platysma penetration underwent directed preoperative imaging, and 15 avoided operative exploration. CT scans were the most common imaging modality (68%). The median injury severity score was 11. The hospital length of stay was longer in the patients who underwent exploration. Mandatory exploration of the neck in children should not be performed unless clinically indicated. Preoperative imaging should be used liberally to limit nontherapeutic explorations, improve diagnostic accuracy, and reduce morbidity.

Penetrating neck injuries in children

Penetrating neck injuries are uncommon in children, and when they do occur, they can be a challenge to manage. Injuries can be cardiovascular, aerodigestive, and neurovascular. In the past, injuries were explored surgically to evaluate the extent of the injury; studies are now showing that observation and less invasive studies have a positive outcome for the patient. Immediate surgical intervention remains mandatory for the clinically unstable patient, whereas stable patients have studies done that pertain to their signs and symptoms, thus having a conservative nonoperative approach to care.

Penetrating neck injuries in children: a retrospective review

OBJECTIVE

Penetrating Neck Injuries (PNI) are uncommon in the pediatric population, but they constitute a significant management challenge. Literature has been scant regarding the evaluation and treatment of such injuries in children. Our objective is to evaluate if physical examination alone is sufficient in the assessment and management of pediatric PNI.

DESIGN

Retrospective chart review.

SETTING

Pediatric emergency center of an urban emergency department (ED) and level 1 trauma center (TC).

PARTICIPANTS

All patients 16 years or younger that had penetrating neck injuries between January 1995 and June 2000.

INTERVENTIONS

None.

RESULTS

During the study period, a total of 148,000 and 9900 patients were seen in the pediatric ED and the TC, respectively. Thirty-one children (22 males, 9 females) with PNI were identified. The median age was 9.5 years (range of 10 months to 16 years). Most children (81%) with PNI were evaluated in the TC. Motor vehicle crashes accounted for 32% of PNI and gun shot wounds for 23% of cases. Most PNI (84%) occurred in zone II of the neck. Eight patients underwent surgical exploration (25.8%) for platysmal penetration, none of which revealed any vascular injuries. Only 4 patients had barium swallows performed based on physical examination findings. All barium swallows were normal. There were no angiograms performed during the study period. A total of 3 patients died (mortality rate of 9%), all of which had major physical examination findings.

CONCLUSION

PNI are infrequent in the pediatric population. Most of the patients in our review presented with minor physical examination findings and did not require exploration or diagnostic studies. Observation of the stable child in our case series was found to be an acceptable choice of management of PNI. Further prospective studies are needed to validate these results.