Gastrointestinal hemorrhage. An unusual complication of total anomalous pulmonary venous drainage.

A newborn boy had exsanguinating gastrointestinal hemorrhage in in the first week of life secondary to an unusual form of infradiaphragmatic pulmonary venous drainage. Autopsy and postmortem angiograms demonstrated huge esophageal varices as the course of the uncontrolled bleeding. The occurrence of massive gastrointestinal hemorrhage should be considered to be a rare but possibly lethal complication in patients with total anomalous pulmonary venous drainage (TAPVD) type III and IV.