Gas Gangrene of the Neck. A Report on 3 Cases.

In 1998, we had three patients with gas gangrene of the neck. All of the patients complained of dyspnea. They received surgical drainage by two skin horizontal incisions, under endotracheal general anesthesia, antibiotics and an IVH for general management.Case 1 was a 62-year-old man with diabetes mellites and multiple metastases of prostal cancer. He died two days after admission. Case 2 was a 63-year-old woman with diabetes mellites, and case 3 was a 75-year-old man. These patients recovered without skin necrosis, but they had a tracheostomy and a swallowing disturbance about one month after surgery. The swallowing disturbance caused their mental states to be unstable.These findings suggest that we should probably undertake emergency tracheostomy, if a patient complains of dyspnea, and take into consideration the problem of a possible swallowing disturbance at recovery, and that two horizontal skin incisions are useful for surgical drainage of gas gangrene of the neck because the lower incision is available for tracheostomy.