Carrie Schaefer

Interventional radiology in the neonate and young infant.

Introduction In the past several decades, the field of pediatric interventional radiology (IR) has grown in all dimensions. The specialty is now mature, and there are many highly trained interventionalists all over the world who are treating children of all ages and sizes. The pediatric IR community has created an extensive array of solutions for diagnosing and treating the wide variety of medical and surgical conditions that occur throughout childhood. It seems clear at this time that the image-guided approach has reduced morbidity and mortality and lowered medical costs for pediatric patients. The same growth in the breadth and depth of minimally invasive diagnostic studies and image-guided therapies has also occurred in neonates and small infants 90 days or younger, however, at a slower pace than for older children. As image-guided procedures are generally less invasive than open procedures, this approach is especially well suited to the smallest children. However, the small size and special needs of these patients present challenges to the safe and effective use of image-guided therapies. The focus of this article is to present an overview of the vascular and nonvascular interventions that can be safely performed in neonates and small infants and to present helpful tips and technical suggestions to make the treatment of these very small patients easier and more effective.