Foreign bodies injuries during COVID-19 Pandemic. The preventible traumas / Lesões por corpos estranhos durante a Pandemia da COVID-19. Os traumas evitáveis

Abstract

As part of the closure of educational institutions to mitigate the spread of COVID-19, children were forced to spend more time at home, and often in very small dwellings, leading to a rapid increase in incidents involving foreign bodies in the natural orifices of the head and neck. In countries with total blockade, the children were at home with their parents and the level of vigilance was higher, but in countries where there was no total blockade and the parents worked outside the home and the infants were left home alone, the scenario was different, with less vigilance and a greater propensity for these types of accidents. This paper intends to draw the attention of parents to the need to strengthen vigilance in order to avoid this type of accident.

Anatomic Explanation for the Presence of Foreign Bodies in Natural Orifices

“…It affects children and adults although, in some locations, it is exclusively pediatric, such as in the nasal passages and bronchi, with exceptions for adults with mental disorders [2]. In the lower airway it is usually caused by an accident [3] and can be fatal. In other locations on the head and neck, in children, it may be intentional to get the parent's attention, teasing or bullying other children or to explore orifices by themselves.…”