[Present and future treatment of esophageal atresia].
There has been steady improvement in the overall survival rate of patients with esophageal atresia during the past 30 years. With modern neonatal intensive care, very low birth-weight infants with esophageal atresia are also expected to survive. However, there are many questions in the treatment including delayed primary surgery and multistaged esophageal elongation for extremely low birth-weight infants and patients with long-gap esophageal atresia, respectively. On the other hand, reports of thoracoscopic repair of esophageal atresia are increasing, although there has been no report on long-term follow-up. This procedure has many advantages including wound cosmesis and little thoracic deformity, but it is technically difficult even for experienced endoscopic surgeons and is performed only in a few children's hospital in Japan. Easier thoracoscopic surgery using robotic technology is expected in the near future.
Department of Pediatric Surgery, University of Tokyo Hospital, Tokyo, Japan.
Tadashi
T
Iwanaka
D004933:Esophageal Atresia / Q000601:surgery*; D006801:Humans; D007231:Infant, Newborn; D019102:Infant, Very Low Birth Weight; D019616:Thoracic Surgical Procedures / Q000639:trends