Anaesthesia for the "Syndromic" Child

Abstract

Often called “funny looking kids” in the corridors and tearooms of medical institutions worldwide, these children may challenge the paediatric anaesthesiologist. So what makes a child look funny? Is it the child’s face or body stature that does not conform to the clinician’s concept of normal? Is it that the child is too fat, too short, too tall, too hairy, too stiff, too floppy, too distorted? Or is it simply that the child has features of a genetic, metabolic, or dysmorphic syndrome that the clinician, through ignorance, labels as funny looking. Far from being funny, these disorders may have significant anaesthetic implications, and ignorance may lead to a disastrous outcome when these children undergo
surgery or diagnostic procedures.