[Bidimensional echocardiography for pre- and post-surgical evaluation of atrio-ventricular canal defects (author's...

Bidimensional echocardiography was employed for pre- and post-surgical evaluation of patients with Atrio-Ventricular Canal (AVC) defects. In 14 of the total 24 patients the echocardiographic images were compared with the actual anatomy at surgical inspection. In all cases bidimensional investigations provided essential clues toward diagnosis of AVC demonstrating the peculiar anatomic disorders (ostium primum, cleft anterior mitral cusp, anomalies of the left ventricular outflow tract). Moreover it made possible to distinguish between partial and complete forms of AVC demonstrating the degree of septal development and, where it present at the level of the interventricular septum, to show the split of the anterior cusp of the common AV valve into a mitral and tricuspidal components. In postoperative evaluations could be clearly visualized the following: the prosthetic patches, the thickened mitral anterior cusp (an indirect image of the sutured cleft) and, in the complete forms, the newly formed individual valvular ostia. Bidimensional echocardiography improved greatly the performance of ultra-sound investigation for patients with AVC.