Factors affecting successful esophageal foreign body removal using a Foley catheter in pediatric patients

• Published in: Clinical and experimental emergency medicine 2021, 8(1), , pp.30-36
• Main Authors: Lim, Donghoon, Kim, Jong Kun, Kim, Yun Jeong, Cho, Yeon Joo, Cho, Jae Wan, Park, Jungbae, Choe, Jae Young, Choe, Byung-Ho
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: child; endoscopy; esophagus; foley catheterization; foreign bodies; Original; 응급의학
• ISSN: 2383-4625; 2383-4625
• DOI: 10.15441/ceem.20.070

This study aimed to determine the factors that affect successful esophageal foreign body (FB) removal using a Foley catheter and to identify methods to increase the success rate. In this retrospective, cross-sectional study, we included pediatric patients who presented with esophageal FB impaction that was removed using a Foley catheter in the emergency departments of tertiary care and academic hospitals. We analyzed the effect of the patients' age, sex, and symptoms; FB type, size, and location; Foley catheter size; complications during FB removal; duration between FB ingestion and removal; operator's years of training; sedation; success rate of FB removal; endoscopy; and patient's posture during FB removal on the success of Foley catheter-based FB removal. Of the 43 patients we enrolled, Foley catheter-based FB removal was successful in 81.4% (35/43) but failed in 18.6% (8/43) of patients; no FB-removal-related complications were reported. There was no significant association between the success rate of Foley catheter-based FB removal and any study variable. A higher number of years in training tended to increase the success rate of Foley catheter-based FB removal, although statistical significance was not achieved. Children's esophageal FB removal is a practical challenge in the emergency rooms, and using a Foley catheter is associated with a high success rate of the removal and low occurrence of complications. In this study, no single variable was found correlated with the success rate of Foley catheter-based esophageal FB removal in pediatric patients, which may indicate multiple variables interacting with one another to affect the success rate.