The first day we hadto set up the OR for anesthesia.
Chris is rigging up blue scavenging tubing to get the anesthetic gases
out of the ORs which had no AC, ventilation or windows.
This OR was tiny. We had an old Ohio Heidbrink kinet.o.meter anesthetic
machine in one room and a Modulus in this one. Neither had a functioning
ventilator. Both were attached to a H oxygen cylinder with an E cylinder
back up on the machine. There was no air or nitrous oxide so all cases
including the tiniest neonates were done on 100 O2.
The bigger OR.
We brought our own Propaq monitors. Nearly all the anesthetics were of inhalational induction with halothane, intubation deep and maintenance was spontaneous respiration with halothane or isoflurane while the one bottle we had lasted. We had two syringes of thiopental which were split amongst a few of the older who did not mind an IV. We had the capability for ECG, oximetry. NIBP and ETCO2. We could not monitor volatile levels but this was not a problem - we just titrated to effect.
Intubation could be challenging in babies with hyrdrocephalus with a large head size. We sometimes had to support the head off the head of the table so the neck could be extended enough for Judy to intubate.
Some kids were older. Chris intubating.
There was not much room at the head of the table, reaching down to turn
the suction on was dangerous. Judy has an ice pack to reduce the swelling
after whacking her head on the machine.
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