Plastic Laryngoscope Blades Don’t Make the Grade

In a head-to-head comparison with stainless-steel blades, plastic came up short.

Problems with sterilization and equipment loss have made single-use devices popular, including plastic laryngoscope blades. In a prospective randomized study from France, anesthesiologists used either a standard stainless-steel blade or a single-use plastic blade to perform laryngoscopy during rapid-sequence intubation in 284 patients undergoing emergency surgery. Patients were block-randomized weekly to the type of blade. All patients received thiopental (5 mg/kg) or etomidate (0.4 mg/kg) plus succinylcholine (1 mg/kg) prior to intubation.

First-attempt failure was significantly more common with the plastic blade than with the stainless-steel blade (17% vs. 3%). Intubation with the stainless-steel blade failed on the first attempt in four p…

Reviewing Author

Ron M. Walls, MD, FRCPC, FACEP, FAAEM