Cardiac surgery in a girl with trisomy 13.

We describe a profoundly retarded infant girl with multiple anomalies caused by trisomy 13. Due to heart failure, which was resistant to medical treatment, we closed successfully a ventricular septal defect at three months of age. She died at 10 months of age. Despite the short survival, we believe that the patient benefitted significantly from the surgical repair of her cardiac defect.