OBJECTIVE: To study mitral valve function in the postoperative period after correction of the partial form of atrioventricular septal defect. METHODS: Fifty patients underwent surgical correction of the partial form of atrioventricular septal defect. Their mean age was 11.8 years and 62% of the patients were males. Preoperative echocardiography showed moderate and severe mitral insufficiency in 44% of the patients. The mitral valve cleft was sutured in 45 (90%) patients (group II - GII). Echocardiographies were performed in the early postoperative period, and 6 and 12 months after hospital discharge. RESULTS: The patients who had some type of arrhythmia in the postoperative period had ostium primum atrial septal defect of a larger size (2.74 x 2.08 cm). All 5 patients in group I (GI), who did not undergo closure of the cleft, had a competent mitral valve or mild mitral insufficiency in the preoperative period. One of these patients began to have moderate mitral insufficiency in the postoperative period. On the other hand, in GII, 88.8% and 82.2% of the patients had competent mitral valve or mild mitral insufficiency in the early and late postoperative periods, respectively. CONCLUSION: The mitral valve cleft was repaired in 90% of cases. Echocardiography revealed competent mitral valve or mild mitral insufficiency in 88.8% and 82.2% of GII patients in the early and late postoperative periods, respectively.

A endocardite infecciosa é uma complicação séria, em pacientes portadores de valvopatias, e, algumas vezes, apresenta dificuldades técnicas para sua correção. Uma dessas situações diz respeito a disfunções de próteses colocadas em posição aórtica, ou de valvas naturais aórticas, em que a endocardite leva à descontinuidade entre o ventrículo esquerdo e a aorta, por comprometimento da continuidade mitroaórtica, ou do septo muscular. No Instituto Dante Pazzanese de Cardiologia, operamos 3 pacientes, nos quais havia abscesso em fundo cego, mas provocando grande separação entre o ventrículo esquerdo e a aorta e nos quais a fixação da prótese não poderia ser feita pelas técnicas habituais, nem pela suspensão do folheto anterior da mitral. Nesses casos, reconstruímos a continuidade entre o ventrículo esquerdo e a aorta, empregando retalho de pericárdio bovino e fixando a prótese, em parte, no anel valvar ainda preservado e, em parte, em um anel criado pelos pontos passados no pericárdio implantado. Um desses pacientes faleceu com 26 dias de pós-operatório, por embolia pulmonar, e com a prótese normal. Os 2 outros receberam alta e estão assintomáticos, com 14 e 4 meses de evolução. O último tem discreto refluxo aórtico, ao ecocardiograma.

Infectious endocarditis is a serious complication in patients with valve diseases and sometimes presents technical difficulties for its treatment. One of those situations concerns prosthesis dysfunctions placed in aortic position or of natural aortic valves, in which endocarditis causes partial descontinuity between the left ventricle and the aorta by the lesion of the continuity of the mitral-aortic or of the muscular septum. In the Instituto Dante Pazzanese de Cardiologia we operated three patients with closed abscesses but with a great separation between the left ventricle and the aorta in which the fixation of the prosthesis couldn't be done by the usual technique nor by the suspension of the anterior mitral leaflet. We reestablished continuity between the left ventricle and the aorta using a patch of bovine paricardium and attaching part of the prosthesis to the preserved valvar ring and the other part in a ring created by the mattress sutures passed in the implanted pericardium. One patient died with 26 days post-surgery due to pulmonary emboly. The other two were discharged and are without symptoms at 14 and 4 months of evolution. The last one has a slight aortic reflux.

No Instituto Dante Pazzanese de Cardiologia, vem sendo realizado, desde 1975, um trabalho conjunto reunindo obstetras, pediatras, cardiologistas, anestesistas e cirurgiões cardiovasculares, com o intuito de melhorar os resultados da cirurgia cardíaca realizada em pacientes grávidas. Para isto, organizamos um protocolo, que inclui desde o pré-operatório até o nascimento da criança, passando por estudos ecocardiográficos, ultrassonográficos e por monitorização fetal durante a cirurgia. Vinte e seis pacientes foram operadas durante a gravidez, sendo 6 delas em 1985, após o início do estudo. Os resultados, tanto do lado materno como do fetal, são bons, não ocorrendo nenhum óbito materno nesta série e com as crianças nascendo bem e sem malformações e com crescimento e desenvolvimento normais, até o 6º mês de vida extra-uterina.

At the Instituto Dante Pazzanese de Cardiologia, a team project has been carried out since 1975, including obstetricians, pediatricians, cardiologists, anesthesiologists and cardiovascular surgeons aim at getting better results of cardiac surgery in pregnant women. For this purpose, the group developed a protocol that goes from the preoperative period to the delivery of the baby, with ecocardiographic and ultrasonic studies and fetal monitoring during the cardiac surgery of the mother. Twenty six patients were submited to cardiac surgery during pregnancy, and six patients after beginning the study, in 1985. The maternal and fetal results were good, without maternal death and the children were born without malformations and having had normal development until the sixth month of life.