The most dangerous things to children are sometimes the most common in items in the household: choking hazards, live wires, and furniture. The most notorious of these are food.
In India, a two-year-old girl in has died after she accidentally took a bite of out a chili. Her reaction to it was so severe that moments after she consumed the fruit, she began vomiting.
Hot peppers contain a chemical called, from which the hot flavor comes from. It causes the body’s blood vessels and even bronchial tubes to dilate slightly.
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The girl’s guardians immediately rushed her to the hospital, but at that point it had already been too late.
It is suspected that when the baby threw up a couple of times, it led to other fluids entering the respiratory track, block the windpipe and caused the baby to choke.
“Aspiration of gastric contents resulting in death due to respiratory failure is not uncommon. However, this is the first such case involving the accidental bite of a chili at our hospital. It is rarely reported in medical-legal literature,” said Dr Chittaranjan Behera, an autopsy surgeon.
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He also said that typically the body protects itself against such situations, usually with reflexive act of coughing, or laryngeal cough reflex.
In the girl case, however, this reflex was suspected to have been poorly developed or had been inactive due to unconsciousness.
Sadly, this led to death.
Preventing pulmonary aspiration
Pulmonary aspiration is the entry of material from the oropharynx or gastrointestinal tract into the larynx and lower respiratory tract.
The lungs are normally protected against aspiration by a series of protective reflexes such as coughing and swallowing.
Significant aspiration can only occur if the protective reflexes are absent or severely diminished (in neurological disease, coma, drug overdose, sedation or general anesthesia).
In intensive care, sitting patients up reduces the risk of pulmonary aspiration and ventilator-associated pneumonia.
In patients at imminent risk of aspiration, tracheal intubation by a trained health professional provides the best protection.
A simpler intervention that can be implemented is to lay the patient on their side in the recovery position, so that any vomitus produced by the patient will drain out their mouth instead of back down their pharynx.
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