Foley catheter and deep hypothermic circulatory arrest to control bleeding in redo cardiac surgery

Two cases with catastrophic hemorrhage in redo cardiac surgery are described. In the first one tearing of right ventricle with uncontrolled bleeding occurred during sternal reentry. In the second one, tearing of the right atria occurred while the patient was on cardiopulmonary bypass. In both cases we were able to control bleeding using Foley catheter, which enabled us to proceed to deep hypothermic circulatory arrest to repair heart chambers (due to dense adhesions it was impossible to manage it in any other way). We have found this combined technique to be extremely useful tool to control catastrophic hemorrhage during redo cardiac surgery.