title: Fresh homografts obtained through a national organ-sharing programme for repair of congenital heart disease.
abstract: Homografts have been used in congenital cardiac surgery for over 30 years. We utilized the resources of a national organ-sharing programme to obtain fresh homografts and report their use in correcting cardiac pathologies in 20 children between March 2001 and May 2003. In 16 patients, a valved conduit was used to form a connection between the pulmonary ventricle and the pulmonary artery. In three patients, a non-valved aortic conduit was used to form an extra-cardiac Fontan circulation and in one patient, non-valved pulmonary and aortic conduits were used to repair an infected aortic aneurysm. Three patients died following surgery. Survivors were followed up using echocardiography between 2 and 24 months post-surgery. Results demonstrate that, with the help of a national organ-sharing programme, the use of fresh homograft conduits is feasible in a paediatric patient population with reasonable waiting times.
authors.affiliation: Ege Sağlik Hospital, Izmir, Turkey. kivancmetin@msn.com
authors.forename: S K
authors.initials: SK
authors.lastname: Metin
authors.forename: B S
authors.initials: BS
authors.lastname: Uğurlu
authors.forename: O
authors.initials: O
authors.lastname: Oto
authors.forename: O N
authors.initials: ON
authors.lastname: Sariosmanoğlu
authors.forename: E
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Hazan
authors.forename: N
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Unal
authors.forename: G S
authors.initials: GS
authors.lastname: Saylam
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Akçoral
authors.forename: C
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Dontlu
mesh_terms: D001014:Aortic Aneurysm / Q000601:surgery; D002648:Child; D006330:Heart Defects, Congenital / Q000145:classification / Q000601:surgery*; D006801:Humans; D017063:Outcome Assessment, Health Care; D009927:Tissue and Organ Procurement; D014184:Transplantation, Homologous