[Heart myxoma. Surgical treatment]

We reviewed all the patients who underwent surgical excision of cardiac myxomas at La Pitié during the last fifteen years. Fifty-one cases were found (32 female and 19 male) aging from 16 to 75 years (mean 51). Congestive heart failure was the primary symptom present in 28 patients. Thirteen patients presented peripheral embolization, four with syncope and 11 with tachyarrhythmias. The diagnosis was made either by echocardiography or angiography. All of them had correct preoperative diagnoses, and no tumors were found incidentally at operation. Forty-six myxomas were localized in the left atrium, four in the right atrium and one in the right ventricle. All the patients underwent open-heart operation and myxomas were successfully removed with excision of a portion of normal atrial septum or wall. Path reconstruction of the atrial septum was required thirty-six times. Mortality after surgical excision is very low. Only one death (1.96%) occurred as a result of a postoperative low output syndrome. Late recurrences have been reported in other series, but no recurrences were diagnosed in our patients up to the present. Although the recurrence rate is low, long-term clinical and echocardiographic follow-up is recommended.