title: Surgical atrial septal defect closure after interventional occluder placement: incidence and outcome.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  Closure of ostium secundum atrial septal defects is generally performed by using an interventional approach. We evaluated the outcome of patients requiring secondary surgical therapy.
  
  
  METHODS
  From September 1996 until December, 2005, 418 patients received interventional and 297 patients underwent surgical closure of an ostium secundum atrial septal defect at our center. Another 15 patients (local, 5; regional, 5; and national, 5 referrals) had complications after occluder placement, and they form the study population.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Indications for surgical repair in these 15 patients were dislocation of the occluder in 5, neurologic events after occluder placement in 5, residual defects in 4, and sepsis with questionable occluder infection in 1 patient. A total of 7 patients had neurologic events, 5 of embolic origin. The interval between interventional occluder placement and definitive surgical repair was 319 +/- 416 days (median 123 days; range 0-1395 days). Patient age at operation was 34.9 +/- 18.6 years. Nine patients were operated on via an anterolateral minithoracotomy, and 6 received a conventional sternotomy. One patient with sepsis underwent abdominal surgery on postoperative day 1 and subsequently died of multiorgan failure; there was no proof of occluder endocarditis. At 2.2 +/- 1.9 years of follow-up, all other patients had returned to full-time work without residual neurologic impairment.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Complications may arise after interventional ostium secundum atrial septal defect closure. This must be evaluated against the extremely low risk of a standard surgical closure. The functional outcome after secondary surgical ostium secundum atrial septal defect closure with removal of an occluder system is excellent.
authors.affiliation: Universität Leipzig, Herzzentrum, Klinik für Herzchirurgie, Leipzig, Germany. walt@medizin.uni-leipzig.de
authors.forename: Thomas
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Walther
authors.forename: Christian
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Binner
authors.forename: Ardawan
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Rastan
authors.forename: Ingo
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Dähnert
authors.forename: Nicolas
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Doll
authors.forename: Volkmar
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Falk
authors.forename: Friedrich W
authors.initials: FW
authors.lastname: Mohr
authors.forename: Martin
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Kostelka
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D006348:Cardiac Surgical Procedures / Q000295:instrumentation; D002648:Child; D002675:Child, Preschool; D005260:Female; D006344:Heart Septal Defects, Atrial / Q000601:surgery*; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D019736:Prostheses and Implants; D012086:Reoperation / Q000706:statistics & numerical data