[Hypoplasia and pulmonary hypertension in Down syndrome: prognostic evaluation using pulmonary biopsy]

The pulmonary hypoplasia, in Down's syndrome with congenital cardiac malformation, probably explains the poor behaviour of these patients, leading to early vascular pulmonary lesions, which progress quickly. We present a case, in which the lung biopsy, done before cardiac surgery, showed a lung hypoplasia and also enabled us to establish the grading of the pulmonary vascular disease. The pathologic evaluation is necessary to decide upon the intracardiac repair and to predict the child's outcome.