Results:
A total of 87 children less than 5 years old with stridor were involved in the study. FB was done in all these selected subjects. The mean age was 20 months and 13 days with the youngest being 3 days old and eldest being 5 years. Amongst these, 53 (60.9%) were boys and 34 (39.1%) were girls. The most common symptom associated with stridor was cough which was observed in 45 (51.72%) children followed by breathlessness (32.18%) and fever (18.39%). There were 4 (4.6%) children who presented with severe respiratory distress involving peripheral and central cyanosis along with grunting. On examination, the most common finding associated with stridor was tachypnea which was observed in 74 (85.05%) cases. Based on the clinical history and examination, 21 (24.13%) children were suspected to have laryngomalacia.
FB was done under all aseptic precautions as mentioned above and the observations were analyzed. 68 (78.16%) out of 87 children with clinical stridor had an abnormal FB finding. Out of these, laryngomalacia was the most common abnormality noted amounting to 20 (29.41%) followed by subglottic stenosis (13.23%) and tracheomalacia (11.76%). Other abnormalities included foreign body aspiration, external compression of airway, laryngeal edema, cyst, GERD, congenital web and dynamic tracheal obstruction. Out of the 21 clinically suspected cases of laryngomalacia, 20 (95.23%) cases were observed to have laryngomalacia on FB. Of all these cases, 78 (89.65%) children were managed conservatively while 9 (10.35%) were referred for surgical intervention. These cases involved severe laryngomalacia causing significant respiratory distress, foreign body aspiration, congenital web and airway cyst. There were no adverse events in any of the cases during the procedure.