Techniques to facilitate placement of gastric tubes under direct vision are not well described. A split nasopharyngeal airway passed blindly into the nasopharynx may facilitate placement. However, this can cause significant trauma, particularly in patients with head and neck tumours. The tumour, previous surgery or radiotherapy distorts anatomy, fixes tissue planes and makes mucosa friable. Anchoring the gastric tube to a nasendoscope with either a soluble gel cap or alginate have been suggested as solutions [1-3]. However neither of these are readily available to the anaesthetist.
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