Single-use laryngoscope blade assessment

Objectives. – To assess the feasibility of switching disposable laryngoscope blades and to compare the disposable blades available on the market to reusable blades within the context of a new variant of Creutzfeldt–Jakob disease.Study design. – Comparative prospective study.Material and methods. – Study conducted on patients intubated for surgical procedures in all operating theatres of a university hospital. The anaesthetic practitioner filled in an assessment form giving a score on nine criteria for each blade used. Data were recorded on Epi Info software. Satisfaction scores of each criterion were compared for both disposable blades and reusable blades.Results. – Six brands of blades were tested with 225 blades. Disposable blades were evaluated as inferior to the reusable blades in 62% of cases. Two blades were reported as more satisfactory: the 670166 Rusch-Pilling and Vital View™ blades.Conclusion. – The disposable blades were not easily accepted by the anaesthetists particularly for difficult intubations, which is why reusable blades should not be totally removed from practice. Single-use blades proposed by different manufacturers are not identical. We chose 670166 Rusch-Pilling blades, the best adapted to our institution. The switch to disposable blades would require that blade manufacturers improve the quality of the blades. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]