An 18 month old female has central and peripheral cyanosis, is struggling to breathe, and has a concave abdomen. What should you do?

Get ready for the Paramedic Readiness Exam 5. Study with multiple-choice questions, detailed explanations, and effective strategies. Enhance your exam preparedness today!

Multiple Choice

An 18 month old female has central and peripheral cyanosis, is struggling to breathe, and has a concave abdomen. What should you do?

When a toddler is cyanotic with labored breathing, the first priority is to support breathing. Using a bag-valve mask provides immediate positive-pressure ventilation and delivers higher concentrations of oxygen, which helps improve both ventilation and oxygenation while you assess the airway and breathing. This is the quickest way to address hypoxemia in a child who is actively struggling to breathe. Trendelenburg isn’t helpful here and can worsen respiratory effort or compromise ventilation in a child. Intubation is a valid next step if bag-valve mask ventilation proves inadequate or the child cannot be ventilated effectively, but it isn’t the immediate action when BVM ventilation can be started right away. Chest compressions are reserved for cardiac arrest (no pulse), not just respiratory distress. The concave abdomen can signal a serious underlying issue such as diaphragmatic atresia or hernia, which is important to note, but the immediate treatment priority remains providing ventilation with a bag-valve mask.

When a toddler is cyanotic with labored breathing, the first priority is to support breathing. Using a bag-valve mask provides immediate positive-pressure ventilation and delivers higher concentrations of oxygen, which helps improve both ventilation and oxygenation while you assess the airway and breathing. This is the quickest way to address hypoxemia in a child who is actively struggling to breathe.

Trendelenburg isn’t helpful here and can worsen respiratory effort or compromise ventilation in a child. Intubation is a valid next step if bag-valve mask ventilation proves inadequate or the child cannot be ventilated effectively, but it isn’t the immediate action when BVM ventilation can be started right away. Chest compressions are reserved for cardiac arrest (no pulse), not just respiratory distress.

The concave abdomen can signal a serious underlying issue such as diaphragmatic atresia or hernia, which is important to note, but the immediate treatment priority remains providing ventilation with a bag-valve mask.

More practice questions