Hello doctor, My brother is having the problem of not able to breathe properly. Now the doctor has planned to advise for tracheostomy. How long it should be in the neck? Will there be any complication?
Hi. See, tracheostomy is done if it is expected that the patient who is on ventilator may take more than 10 days to come out of ventilator. Now the duration till it will be there in neck depends on the cause for which tracheostomy has been done. If his primary disease improves, the doctors will do a trial of room air breathing by temporarily closing tracheostomy site but if primary disease is not improving then they will keep it as long as the disease does not improve. Complications include infections, bleeding, excessive secretion from airway may block the tracheostomy.