Despite the improvements achieved in the pediatric anesthesia safety in our institution, the perioperative cardiac arrest rates are still high and similar to the developing countries rates, with the child's disease or condition being the most important trigger for cardiac arrest. Airway management continues to be the greatest cause of anesthesia-related cardiac arrest.

In 2006, a previous study at our institution reported high perioperative and anesthesia-related mortality rates of 21.97 and 1.12 per 10,000 anesthetics, respectively. Since then, changes in surgical practices may have decreased these rates. However, the actual perioperative and anesthesia-related mortality rates in Brazil remains unknown. The study aimed to reexamine perioperative and anesthesia-related mortality rates in one Brazilian tertiary teaching hospital.In this observational study, deaths occurring in the operation room and postanesthesia care unit between April 2005 and December 2012 were identified from an anesthesia database. The data included patient characteristics, surgical procedures, American Society of Anesthesiologists (ASA) physical status, and medical specialty teams, as well as the types of surgery and anesthesia. All deaths were reviewed and grouped by into 1 of 4 triggering factors groups: totally anesthesia-related, partially anesthesia-related, surgery-related, or disease/condition-related. The mortality rates are expressed per 10,000 anesthetics with 95% confidence intervals (CIs).A total of 55,002 anesthetics and 88 deaths were reviewed, representing an overall mortality rate of 16.0 per 10,000 anesthetics (95% CI: 13.0–19.7). There were no anesthesia-related deaths. The major causes of mortality were patient disease/condition-related (13.8, 95% CI: 10.7–16.9) followed by surgery-related (2.2, 95% CI: 1.0–3.4). The major risks of perioperative mortality were children younger than 1-year-old, older patients, patients with poor ASA physical status (III–V), emergency, cardiac or vascular surgeries, and multiple surgeries performed under the same anesthetic technique (P < 0.0001).There were no anesthesia-related deaths. However, the high mortality rate caused by the poor physical conditions of some patients suggests that primary prevention might be the key to reducing perioperative mortality. These findings demonstrate the need to improve medical perioperative practices for high-risk patients in under-resourced settings.

Very little evidence from randomized controlled trials suggests differences in participant outcomes with anaesthesia maintained by intravenous versus inhalational anaesthesia during one-lung ventilation. If researchers believe that the type of drug used to maintain anaesthesia during one-lung ventilation is important, they should design randomized controlled trials with appropriate participant outcomes, rather than report temporary fluctuations in physiological variables.

We studied the effects of tracheal tube cuffs filled with air, saline or alkalinised lidocaine on haemodynamic changes during tracheal extubation and postoperative laryngotracheal morbidity in children. We randomly allocated 164 children aged 3-13 years undergoing general anaesthesia to one of four groups; tracheal tube cuffs filled with air (n = 41); saline (n = 41); alkalinised lidocaine 0.5% (n = 41); or alkalinised lidocaine 1% (n = 41). Intracuff pressure was monitored and maintained below 20 cmH O. The mean (SD) increases in systolic blood pressure after tracheal extubation compared with before extubation were 10.9 (10.8) mmHg, 7.3 (17.7) mmHg, 4.1 (10.5) mmHg and 1.9 (9.5) mmHg in the air, saline, 0.5% and 1% alkalinised lidocaine groups, respectively (p = 0.021). The mean (SD) increases in diastolic blood pressure after tracheal extubation compared with before extubation were 3.9 (9.7) mmHg, 7.9 (14.6) mmHg, 0.7 (10.4) mmHg and 3.6 (6.9) mmHg in the air, saline, 0.5% and 1% alkalinised lidocaine groups, respectively (p = 0.019). The mean (SD) increases in heart rate after tracheal extubation compared with before extubation were 14.2 (7.6) beats.min , 15.5 (13.1) beats.min , 5.2 (9.6) beats.min and 4.1 (6.6) beats.min in the air, saline, 0.5% and 1% alkalinised lidocaine groups, respectively (p < 0.001). The incidence of sore throat 8 h after tracheal extubation was 22.0% in the air-filled group, 9.8% in the saline group, 4.9% in the 0.5% alkalinised lidocaine group and 2.4% in the 1% alkalinised lidocaine group, p = 0.015. We conclude that filling the tracheal tube cuff with alkalinised lidocaine-filled reduces the haemodynamic response to tracheal extubation and postoperative laryngotracheal morbidity in children.

Introduction Studies have shown that both perioperative and anesthesia-related cardiac arrest (CA) and mortality rates are much higher in developing countries than in developed countries. This review aimed to compare the rates of perioperative and anesthesia-related CA and mortality during 2 time periods in Brazil. Methods A systematic review with meta-analysis of full-text Brazilian observational studies was conducted by searching the Medline, EMBASE, LILACS and SciELO databases up to January 29, 2020. The primary outcomes were perioperative CA and mortality rates and the secondary outcomes included anesthesia-related CA and mortality events rates up to 48 postoperative hours. Results Eleven studies including 719,273 anesthetic procedures, 962 perioperative CAs, 134 anesthesia-related CAs, 1,239 perioperative deaths and 29 anesthesia-related deaths were included. The event rates were evaluated in 2 time periods: pre-1990 and 1990–2020. Perioperative CA rates (per 10,000 anesthetics) decreased from 39.87 (95% confidence interval [CI]: 34.60–45.50) before 1990 to 17.61 (95% CI: 9.21–28.68) in 1990–2020 (P < 0.0001), while the perioperative mortality rate did not alter (from 19.25 [95% CI: 15.64–23.24] pre-1990 to 25.40 [95% CI: 13.01–41.86] in 1990–2020; P = 0.1984). Simultaneously, the anesthesia-related CA rate decreased from 14.39 (95% CI: 11.29–17.86) to 3.90 (95% CI: 2.93–5.01; P < 0.0001), while there was no significant difference in the anesthesia-related mortality rate (from 1.75 [95% CI: 0.76–3.11] to 0.67 [95% CI: 0.09–1.66; P = 0.5404). Conclusions This review demonstrates an important reduction in the perioperative CA rate over time in Brazil, with a large and consistent decrease in the anesthesia-related CA rate; however, there were no significant differences in perioperative and anesthesia-related mortality rates between the assessed time periods.