Atrial septal defect in end-stage liver disease children before and after liver transplantation

Atrial septal defect (ASD) is a common congenital heart defect. The course and impact of hemodynamically insignificant ASD in end-stage liver disease (ESLD) patients remains to be elucidated. Our objective is to present our experience in live donor liver transplantation in children with secundum type of ASD and to find out whether ASD has an impact on the outcome of liver transplantation.

Fourteen recipients (7 male, 7 female) whose median age was 14.2 months (range, 8-28) were included. The diagnosis of secundum type of ASD was confirmed by transthoracic 2-dimensional Doppler echocardiography preoperatively. The mean Child's score was 9.9, and the mean Pediatric End-stage Liver Disease Score was 14.7. The ASD were classified based on physiologic-hemodynamic (insignificant vs significant) and structural size (small [/=10 mm]) parameters. Only 1 patient showed hemodynamically significant ASD based on echocardiography and cardiac catheterization findings.

Six small ASD spontaneously closed during the waiting period for transplantation. Four small ASD spontaneously closed posttransplant. The medium- and large-sized ASD persisted or increased in size posttransplantation. There were no perioperative cardiac complications. There were no neurologic complications. All patients are alive with the original grafts. The median follow-up was 49.7 months (range, 19.8-79.4).

Hemodynamic insignificant ASD seems to not impact the outcome of liver transplantation in children with ESLD. Further, this series demonstrated that transplantation can be successfully and safely performed in the presence of hemodynamically stable patients with small- to large-sized ASD.