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You have to ventilate the patient with a thoracostomy, or you just give them a big pneumothorax. Duncan ----- Original Message ----- From: [log in to unmask] Sent: 01 May 2002 16:46 To: [log in to unmask] Subject: Chest drains - at all?? How do people feel about using chest drains pre-hospital? In some places they just do a thoracostomy, make sure the hole is a decent size and don't put the drain in until they reach hospital. I don't know if this results in more complications such as the thoracostomy hole closing off en route, haemmorhage from the wound site, infection etc but it certainly saves time and means you have less equipment to worry about in a speeding, crowded ambulance. Ross Murphy SpR EdinburghGet more from the Web. FREE MSN Explorer download : http://explorer.msn.com