How do trauma surgeons deal with the fact that the patients they operate on probably haven’t fasted the night before given that trauma patients don’t know in advance they’ll be having surgery?

Question

I know that with elective surgeries, patients have to fast the night before to prevent vomiting when they go under anesthetic, but I was wondering how this concern is navigated in trauma or emergency surgeries in which patients definitely didn’t fast the night before? Do they just try to deal with the vomit or is there a special procedure to prevent vomiting from occurring?

In: 1727

Answer 1

Risk management. If you have an elective surgery, there’s time to go for maximum risk reduction e.g. two showers with chlorhexidine before the surgical site is sanitized multiple times anyway. Aspirating *could* be a problem that *might* be a complication, so avoid anything that *might* cause it.

But if the patient is at .12 blood alcohol after clubbing all night and needs trauma surgery from a car wreck and can’t tell you *what* they’ve eaten and / or used besides booze, well, this is the hospital.