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A prior study showed that anesthesiologists perform bag-valve mask ventilation better with the two-handed thenar-eminence (TE) technique than with the one-handed E-C clamp (EC) grip taught by the American Heart Association (JW Emerg Med Oct 29 2010), but is this true for novice operators also? Researchers enrolled 59 medical and paramedic students to perform facemask ventilation on apneic adult elective surgery patients using both grips in random order. An oropharyngeal airway was placed and students performed each technique for 60 seconds, while an attending anesthesiologist ventilated the patient.
The overall mean tidal volume achieved was similar for the TE–EC and EC–TE sequences (326 and 321 mL). On average, students achieved an addition…