Surgical treatment of congenital pelvic arteriovenous malformation.

Congenital arteriovenous fistulas often pose difficult diagnostic and management problems. Surgical therapy has been associated with a propensity for incomplete obliteration and recurrence. A case of a large congenital pelvic arteriovenous malformation, initially misdiagnosed as an atrial septal defect, was defined by selective roentgenographic and contrast echographic techniques and successfully treated by total surgical excision.