Tracheal position
- The tracheal position also indicates the apex beat position.
- The normal position of trachea is slight deviation towards the right
Methods to examine tracheal position.
Method 1
- Stand in front of the patient.
- Make sure the patient is sitting or standing and never lying down
- Gently palpate the cricoid cartilage with your finger and run it downwards to the suprasternal notch and assess
Method 2
- The other method is to palpate the space between sternomastoid muscle and trachea.
The space can be made prominent by asking the patient to look towards one side. - The angle feels narrowed in the side there is trachea deviation.
Conditions with trachea shift to same side of lesion
- Fibrosis of lung
- Collapse of lung
Trachea shift to opposite of lesion
- Pleural effusion
- Pneumothorax
- Hydropneumothorax
- Empyema