Conotruncal repair of tetralogy of Fallot.

A repair within the conotruncal portion of the right ventricle is introduced. It was used for the intracardiac repair of 30 consecutive patients with tetralogy of Fallot. The infundibular septum was totally resected to reduce the muscular outflow stenosis. Short patch infundibuloplasty with a large monocusp was then used. Instead of the tricuspid septal leaflet, the membranous flap was employed as the suture line for patching the ventricular septal defect (VSD) to avoid a conduction disturbance, residual VSD, and fixing of the tricuspid septal leaflet. The right ventricular (RV) to systemic arterial pressure ratio was 50.0 +/- 14.6% (N = 26) and right atrial pressure was 9.0 +/- 2.5 mm Hg (N = 26) one month after operation. RV end-diastolic volume was 93.0 +/- 30.5% of normal (N = 15) before operation and 96.7 +/- 29.0% of normal one month after operation in the same patients. These data suggest that a conotruncal repair can maintain good RV function with low right atrial pressure and with no increase of RV volume.