13 ROJE - SIGNA 26.indd

Tonsillectomy is one of the most common operative procedures in childhood. According to the Croatian national guidelines for the treatment of sore throat (ISKRA guidelines), apsolute indications for tonsillectomy are recurrent tonsillitis (>4 per year) and sleep disordered breathing (including snoring and obstructive sleep apnea). Most children in Croatia undergo conventional cold steel tonsillectomy with bipolar diathermy coagulation using reusable surgical accessories. Estimated blood loss during this type of surgery is about 10% of complete blood volume. That is why, tonsillectomy is performed mostly in children 3 years of age and above because their weight and blood volume. Coblation tonsillectomy results in less postoperative blood loss and less postoperative morbidity and is therefore the method of choice for operating on very small children. We present the case of a 3-year-old girl with somatic retardation (height 92 cm, weight 9,280 kg) who underwent coblation tonsilloadenoidectomy. As far as we now, this procedure has never been performed in a child of lower weight. ŽELJKA ROJE ( ) • School of Medicine, University of Split