The Norwood procedure for hypoplastic left heart syndrome: results of the King Chulalongkorn Memorial Hospital

ABSTRACT

Background: The Norwood procedure is often performed to treat hypoplastic left heart syndrome (HLHS). Only Blalock-Taussig (BT) shunt is used with the Norwood procedure in our institute.Objective: To analyze the first-stage palliation for HLHS.Patients and methods: The Norwood procedure with right modified BT shunt was performed in 26 patients with HLHS between August 1996 and November 2008. The first four patients were performed using only autologous great vessel tissue (group 1), and the other 22 patients were operated with the Norwood procedure using a homograft for arch reconstruction (group 2).Results: The hospital mortality was 50.0 % in group 1 and 18.2% in group 2. The overall hospital mortality was 23.1%. Four out of twenty survivors (20%) had the modified Fontan procedure.Conclusion: Only a limited number of pediatric cardiac centers offered surgical treatment of the hypoplastic left heart syndrome. The survival rate in our study was in acceptable range despite the limited resource.