Cardiac tumors in infants and children: study of 120 operated patients.
Cardiac tumors in children are rare, and patient series are limited in size. We report 120 children who underwent surgery to treat a cardiac tumor; the tumor type was known in 108 instances. The patients represented <0.1 % of 130,000 cardiac surgeries performed in children from a multi-institutional data base. The most common tumors and the number of patients were rhabdomyoma (n = 42), myxoma (n = 28), and fibromas (n = 10). The remaining 18 tumors of various types occurred in smaller numbers of patients. Nine patients (7 %) died after surgery. The mean age of death was 14 days, and death was most frequent in patients with fibromas (n = 4). Considering the variety of tumors, their varied location in cardiac structures, the patient ages, and the infrequent occurrence in an individual surgeon's experience, the operative mortality was low.
Arkansas Children's Hospital, Little Rock, AR 72202, USA.
Kyle J
KJ
Bielefeld
James H
JH
Moller
D000293:Adolescent; D006348:Cardiac Surgical Procedures / Q000401:mortality / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D002648:Child; D002675:Child, Preschool; D006338:Heart Neoplasms / Q000401:mortality / Q000473:pathology / Q000601:surgery*; D006801:Humans; D007223:Infant; D007231:Infant, Newborn; D012189:Retrospective Studies; D015996:Survival Rate; D016896:Treatment Outcome; D055815:Young Adult