Tasuku Kadowaki

Aortic Root Reimplantation for Isolated Sinus of Valsalva Aneurysm in the Patient With Marfan's Syndrome

We describe an isolated extracardiac unruptured acquired aneurysm in the right coronary sinus of Valsalva, which was seen in a 55-year-old woman with Marfans syndrome. The patient underwent aortic root replacement using a reimplantation technique. Pathologic examination revealed absence of the medial elastic fiber of the aortic wall of the normal sinus of Valsalva. This result supports the preference of entire root replacement instead of patch repair of the affected sinus for the isolated aneurysm in 1 sinus of Valsalva in a patient with Marfans syndrome.

Landiolol for junctional ectopic tachycardia refractory to amiodarone after pediatric cardiac surgery

Postoperative junctional ectopic tachycardia (JET) in children undergoing cardiac surgery is a serious arrhythmia that is associated with considerable morbidity and mortality. We present here a case of successful landiolol therapy for postoperative JET in a 3-month-old infant who underwent ventricular septal defect closure and right pulmonary artery plasty. His left ventricular function was poor postoperatively. The JET was refractory to amiodarone and caused severe hypotension, which was required cardiac massage. Continuous intravenous infusion of low-dose landiolol reduced the persistent JET rate immediately, and restored to sinus rhythm with stable hemodynamics.

Aortic arch augmentation using a pulmonary artery autograft patch and a reversed left subclavian artery flap for an interrupted aortic arch type B complex.

Adequate arch augmentation for interrupted aortic arch repair is quite important to avoid post-operative recoarctation and bronchial compression. We describe here two successful cases of aortic arch reconstruction using autologous materials such as a pulmonary artery patch and a reversed left subclavian artery flap in infants with an interrupted aortic arch type B complex.

A True Aneurysm of Posterior Tibial Artery

True aneurysms of tibial artery are uncommon. We report a case of a 47-year-old woman who suffered from a distal embolism in the left toes. The surgical intervention involved an aneurysmectomy and the interposition of the posterior tibial artery using the saphenous vein graft. She has been doing well 22 months after the operation.

Mitral Commissural Repair With Autologous Fresh Pericardium in an Infant

We describe the successful mitral valve repair with autologous fresh pericardium in a 5-month-old infant with acute progressive mitral regurgitation. The intraoperative findings consisted of fragile mitral valve leaflets with multiple chordal rupture of both the anterior and posterior leaflets. The disrupted anterolateral commissure was reconstructed using autologous fresh pericardium, a technique not previously reported in an infant of this size. Follow-up echocardiography for up to 7 years showed only trivial mitral regurgitation and no mitral stenosis.

Successful bicuspid aortic valve repair using external aortic annuloplasty.

A 33-year-old man presented with severe aortic insufficiency due to a prolapsed bicuspid aortic valve. The ventriculoaortic junction was dilated to 29 mm without root dilatation, and external ring annuloplasty was performed using a Gelweave (Terumo, Tokyo, Japan) graft to reduce the size to 22 mm. The leaflets were repaired by dividing and suturing a raphe between the right and left cusps. This combination provided adequate coaptation depth (8 mm) and showed excellent results, with trivial aortic insufficiency. This approach is suitable for repair of a bicuspid aortic valve with a dilated ventriculoaortic junction without root dilatation.

Primary sutureless repair for simple total anomalous pulmonary venous connection with a risk of postoperative pulmonary venous stenosis

Late mortality following surgical repair of total anomalous pulmonary venous connection (TAPVC) is often associated with pulmonary venous stenosis. We describe here two successful cases of primary sutureless repair for simple TAPVC in patients who had a potential risk of postoperative pulmonary venous stenosis. A 10-day-old neonate with mixed-type TAPVC and a 30-day-old infant with supracardiac TAPVC underwent primary sutureless repair with our modification. In the early follow-up, both patients are now doing well and have no signs of pulmonary venous stenosis. The sutureless repair can be applied as a primary surgical option to prevent postoperative pulmonary venous stenosis in selective patients with simple TAPVC.

Simultaneous complex single ventricle palliation and tracheoplasty for heterotaxy syndrome

Although isomerism of the bronchial tree is an integral part of hetrotaxy syndrome, the association of congenital tracheal stenosis is rare in this group of disorders, and it has not yet been thoroughly described in the literature. This condition is potentially life-threatening and precludes single ventricle palliation. This report presents the case of a 5-month old infant with symptomatic congenital tracheal stenosis, functionally univentricular heart and extracardiac total anomalous pulmonary venous connection (TAPVC). The condition was successfully treated with bidirectional Glenn anastomosis, central pulmonary artery plasty, repair of TAPVC and slide tracheoplasty.