Development, Growth, and Cardiac Surgery

In this issue of AJDC, Mendoza and coworkers report the results of neurodevelopmental testing and somatic growth in 24 of 27 late survivors of arterial switch operations for transposition of the great arteries performed at Korsair Children's Hospital, Louisville, Ky. Six early deaths (18.2%) occurred among the 33 patients who underwent arterial switch operations, and three patients did not undergo followup testing. The data show that 18 (75%) had normal growth, while six had small head circumference. Developmental scores were within one SD of normal for 18 patients. Of the remaining six, three had scores between one and two SDs below normal, and three had scores that were greater than two SDs below normal. Previous reports^1,2 provide some information about developmental outcomes of patients who underwent cardiac repairs in infancy, but very little information about patients who underwent neonatal repair. In the report by Mendoza