Pulmonary Artery Banding and Surgical Results

Between the years 1985-1990, 14 pulmonary artery banding procedures were done on patients with various congenital cardiac malformations at the İstanbul University Institute of Cardiology. Patients' ages varied between 2.5 months and 3 years, and their weight between 3.5-11 kg. Two of them had large VSD and pulmonary hypertension, the remainder had complex postoperative period. Four of 6 patients died whose pulmonary artery pressure was reduced to a level below 30 mmHg, whereas only 1 in eight patients whose pressure was adjusted to over 30 mmHg after banding (p<0.001). Although pulmonary artery banding is a good palliative procedure in patients with congenital cardiac malformations associated with increased pulmoray blood flow, it has a high mortality in some complex cases and in truncus arteriosus, especially when the pulmonary artery pressure is reduced to a level below 30 mmHg.