Planning ventriculoperitoneal shunts in infants and small children

A neurosurgeon planning a ventriculoperitoneal shunt in an infant or child must consider the question of how long a shunt to use in order to compensate for linear growth. Ideally, the system should be just long enough to accommodate the child's further development without being any longer than necessary. To approach the problem systematically, we used established criteria for prediction of growth to determining the catheter length required in adulthood. Our aim was to devise a simple 'rule of thumb' method for determining the catheter length necessary for maximal survival of a functioning shunt system.