Airway Management: Basics for Healthcare Providers
Course #30010 - $30 -
- Participation Instructions
- Review the course material online or in print.
- Complete the course evaluation.
- Review your Transcript to view and print your Certificate of Completion. Your date of completion will be the date (Pacific Time) the course was electronically submitted for credit, with no exceptions. Partial credit is not available.
The most important intervention in any urgent or emergent situation is securing the airway and ensuring adequate ventilation. The key points are call for help as soon as possible and always use the simplest possible intervention. By following these guidelines, the average healthcare provider has the potential to make a tremendous impact on the patient's disease or injury and ensure that the patient survives long enough to receive definitive care. The information presented in this course will help anyone address patients' airway problems in an efficient and effective fashion.
This course is designed for healthcare professionals involved in monitoring and maintaining patients' airways, including nurses and respiratory therapists.
Gaining control of the airway in a compromised patient is absolutely crucial. The purpose of this course is to provide practitioners, whether in the clinic, the intensive care unit, the emergency room, or in the community as a prehospital provider, with the clinical knowledge needed to rapidly and effectively assess the patient's airway and intervene efficiently to begin to ventilate the patient in distress.
Upon completion of this course, you should be able to:
- Outline the pertinent history of airway management.
- Review the anatomy and physiology of the mouth, oropharynx, nose, nasopharynx, and conducting airways of the lung.
- Distinguish between the terms dead space and shunt, and explain how they can be altered.
- Review the gas laws and determine the amount of oxygen being sent to the alveoli when the airway is managed.
- Discuss the assessment of a patient prior to airway management.
- Describe steps to manipulate the airway of a patient in respiratory distress.
- Compare and contrast various devices available for airway management.
Richard E. Haas, BSN, MSN, EdM, PhD, CRNA, LTC US Army Nurse Corps (Retired), is a retired nurse anesthetist and prehospital registered nurse (instructor) who has published extensively in various areas of healthcare research while providing clinical care in arenas ranging from academic medical centers to austere environments in the third world during both wartime and peacetime. He has a bachelor’s degree in nursing from Georgetown University, Master’s degrees in education (Boston University) and nursing specializing in anesthesia (State University of New York in Buffalo and U.S. Army), and a PhD from the University of South Carolina. He is a retired lieutenant colonel in the U.S. Army Nurse Corps. He has taught nursing anesthesia, pharmacology, and physiology; mentored students in doctoral programs; and used advanced patient simulation to train students. Dr. Haas has worked in clinical, administrative, education, and research roles. He continues to work as an independent consultant, while taking more time to enjoy life with his wife of nearly 50 years and their children and grandchildren.
Contributing faculty, Richard E. Haas, BSN, MSN, EdM, PhD, CRNA, LTC US Army Nurse Corps (Retired), has disclosed no relevant financial relationship with any product manufacturer or service provider mentioned.
Jane C. Norman, RN, MSN, CNE, PhD
The division planner has disclosed no relevant financial relationship with any product manufacturer or service provider mentioned.
Sarah Campbell
The Director of Development and Academic Affairs has disclosed no relevant financial relationship with any product manufacturer or service provider mentioned.
The purpose of NetCE is to provide challenging curricula to assist healthcare professionals to raise their levels of expertise while fulfilling their continuing education requirements, thereby improving the quality of healthcare.
Our contributing faculty members have taken care to ensure that the information and recommendations are accurate and compatible with the standards generally accepted at the time of publication. The publisher disclaims any liability, loss or damage incurred as a consequence, directly or indirectly, of the use and application of any of the contents. Participants are cautioned about the potential risk of using limited knowledge when integrating new techniques into practice.
It is the policy of NetCE not to accept commercial support. Furthermore, commercial interests are prohibited from distributing or providing access to this activity to learners.
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The role of implicit biases on healthcare outcomes has become a concern, as there is some evidence that implicit biases contribute to health disparities, professionals' attitudes toward and interactions with patients, quality of care, diagnoses, and treatment decisions. This may produce differences in help-seeking, diagnoses, and ultimately treatments and interventions. Implicit biases may also unwittingly produce professional behaviors, attitudes, and interactions that reduce patients' trust and comfort with their provider, leading to earlier termination of visits and/or reduced adherence and follow-up. Disadvantaged groups are marginalized in the healthcare system and vulnerable on multiple levels; health professionals' implicit biases can further exacerbate these existing disadvantages.
Interventions or strategies designed to reduce implicit bias may be categorized as change-based or control-based. Change-based interventions focus on reducing or changing cognitive associations underlying implicit biases. These interventions might include challenging stereotypes. Conversely, control-based interventions involve reducing the effects of the implicit bias on the individual's behaviors. These strategies include increasing awareness of biased thoughts and responses. The two types of interventions are not mutually exclusive and may be used synergistically.