Ask HN: Is anyone working on a less painful intubation tube?
It may have been a technique issue as well - the RT or pulmonolgist or anesthesiologist (whoever put your tube in- it varies between hospitals) may have made multiple attempts and&#x2F;or scratched your larynx. Every second they spend placing the tube in your throat is a second you&#x27;re not getting ventilation, so they prioritize speed (and accuracy!) over comfort.    Also tubes come in different sizes so perhaps they used a large one for your anatomy.<p>You say you &quot;just&quot; had surgery- you probably still have a lot of inflammation on your palatine tonsils and vocal fold area, making your throat scratchy.  It should go back to normal in a few days.<p>It&#x27;s not really the &quot;tube&quot; that hurts- what hurts is the removal.  While it&#x27;s in during surgery your anatomy gets used to the tube there and kind of all settles in place around it, getting comfy.  When it&#x27;s pulled out, it feels like it&#x27;s being ripped out and it&#x27;s kind of a shock to your system.  Imagine if you hiked the Appalachian Trail for a few months and never changed your boots or your socks and the skin kind of melded into the socks and then at the end of your hike I quickly whipped your socks off.  Your throat right now is like how your feet would feel.<p>The thing with the tubes is they have to be rigid enough to stand up to the insertion which while a delicate process actually takes more force than you&#x27;d think so they need to have a pretty solid structure and also can&#x27;t collapse on themselves while keeping the airway open.  There&#x27;s a lot of &quot;stuff&quot; that can come up in the tube or goes down through them - phlegm, sticky sputum, tonsil stones, &quot;gunk,&quot; blood, lasers, cutting tools, biopsy tissue, etc. Can&#x27;t have risk of the tube having divets or anything where something could get caught on or stuck to and block the airway.  They also will have plastic and metal suction tubes and cameras and things inserted down inside the tube, so the sometimes the width of the tube depends on the procedure they&#x27;re doing and what how big it is based on the things going through it.<p>I&#x27;m not a doctor, just a former respiratory therapist but I&#x27;d recommend taking ibuprofen and if it&#x27;s still bothering your sending a message or calling your doctor tomorrow for their input.<p>As far as making a more comfortable tube  - they already use water and gel based lubrication to make the insertion and extubation process more comfortable on the airway.  Your idea of a lab-grown natural membrane is interesting, but imo too much medical liability around having the tube be comfortable- would way rather have the patient have a stable airway and uncomfortable throat for a week than the airway collapse mid procedure and have brain damage or worse from an occluded airway.<p>Maybe a longer lasting lubricant so it could last through and still be lubed up for the extubation, however maybe they don&#x27;t do that because of risk of it dripping down the tube into the lungs.  Generally anything fluid in the lungs is bad and that&#x27;s why your cilia along your bronchioles bring up all that gunk we cough up on a daily basis.<p>Anyways- hope you feel better soon!  Fwiw, pain on extubation was a very common complaint- it&#x27;s one of the reasons patients who frequently or need long term ventilation will have a temporary or permanent tracheostomy which goes in through the throat directly and skips the delicate tissue around the vocal anatomy.<p>Edit- here are two good papers I found googling about this that you might want to read for more info:<p>Larger review of 9 studies&#x2F;775 pts: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov&#x2F;pmc&#x2F;articles&#x2F;PMC7219530&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov&#x2F;pmc&#x2F;articles&#x2F;PMC7219530&#x2F;</a><p>Voice loss following intubation: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.arwy.org&#x2F;article.asp?issn=2665-9425;year=2019;volume=2;issue=2;spage=57;epage=63;aulast=Kotekar" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.arwy.org&#x2F;article.asp?issn=2665-9425;year=2019;vo...</a>  &lt;-- what I found interesting from this one is it references between 5-90% of patients have some postop symptoms!  Oof.<p>&gt; The incidence of laryngopharyngeal symptoms after endotracheal intubation varies between 5.7% and 90%. These are usually mild and transient requiring minimal active intervention or none at all. Most resolve in 12-72 h, with an exception in cases of injury to vocal folds or arytenoids.[2]