oa Airway trolley in the Emergency Department – A service development project case report

Background: Hamad General Hospital (HGH) houses the main Emergency Department (ED) in Qatar. This busy ED has a 27 bedded resuscitation area. Within a 24 hour period there could be any number between 1 to 10 cases that needed emergency or urgent intubation. Over the years, there has been multiple addition of new life saving devices to the resuscitation areas. All these devices add to the clutter of the already crowded resuscitation area, and may indirectly add to the chaos and occupational risk typically seen in a busy environment.

Methods: We aim to develop an airway trolley (by re-cycling available parts in the hospital) which can accommodate all standard airway equipment and all of our current difficult airway devices – Glidoscope, Stortz CMAC video laryngoscope and Stortz Flexible Intubating Video Endoscope.

Results: We created a robust and easy to clean trolley, with ample of work platform and storage spaces within easy reach. At the same time it is also small and mobile enough to tolerate our narrow resuscitation room floor space. It has multiple power sockets to charge all of the video intubating devices, and its main power cord is long enough to reach any wall socket without significantly obstructing medical staff movements.

Conclusion: With the help of the Engineering Department, we managed to create an airway trolley that fulfills our exact requirement more than what we can find in the current medical equipment market. At the same time we also declutter our busy ED resuscitation room.