Managing Hemorrhages in Patients with Head and Neck Carcinomas: A Descriptive Study of Six Years of Admissions to an Internal Medicine/Palliative Care Unit

Oncologic emergencies in critical care

“…If nutrition is interrupted by infection, ischemia, tumor invasion, radiation, or surgical damage, the arterial wall weakens, increasing the risk for pseudoaneurysm and rupture (Lesage, 1986). Risk factors for CBS include radical neck resection, radiation therapy and postradiation necrosis, combined radio-surgery techniques, recurrent tumor with soft tissue invasion, infection, pharyngocutaneous fistula formation, poor wound healing, and flap necrosis with carotid exposure (Chaloupka et al, 1996;Chang et al, 2007;Garcia-Egido and Payares-Herrera, 2011;Macdonald et al, 2000;Maran, Amin, and Wilson, 1989). Risk factors for CBS include radical neck resection, radiation therapy and postradiation necrosis, combined radio-surgery techniques, recurrent tumor with soft tissue invasion, infection, pharyngocutaneous fistula formation, poor wound healing, and flap necrosis with carotid exposure (Chaloupka et al, 1996;Chang et al, 2007;Garcia-Egido and Payares-Herrera, 2011;Macdonald et al, 2000;Maran, Amin, and Wilson, 1989).…”