A 37-year-old man was transferred to our level I trauma center after a road traffic accident, presenting with right acetabular fracture, multiple rib fractures, epidural hemorrhage, and liver contusion. Severe traumatic tricuspid regurgitation was also discovered during the work-up for surgery. Our initial attempt at acetabular surgery failed when the patient experienced near cardiac arrest during anesthetic induction. It was hence decided that tricuspid valve repair should precede orthopedic surgery. Minimally invasive tricuspid valve repair using the double orifice technique was successfully performed. Subsequently, acetabular surgery was performed and he was discharged 35 days post-trauma without any complications.

Traumatic Tricuspid Regurgitation Treated by the Minimally Invasive Double Orifice Technique.

A 60-year-old male was transferred to our emergency department for evaluation and treatment for mild dyspnea and pericardial effusion detected by chest computerized tomography (CT) scan at 2 days after an anterior chest wall and left hand blunt trauma, which occurred when the patient was unwinding a bulky steel chain during sailing. Before transfer, the patient experienced an episode of hypotension and tachycardia during orthopedic surgery to repair multiple left upper phalanges fractures at a local medical center. At admission, he complained of mild dyspnea, determined to be New York Heart Association (NYHA) functional class I, without neck vein distention or edema of the face and periphery. The patient did, however, present with multiple shallow abrasions, approximately 10 x 10 cm in size on the anterior chest wall and no chest pain or tenderness. Vital signs were recorded: blood pressure 100/60 mmHg and pulse rate 110 beats/min. Tongue dehydration was detected. An Kosin Medical Journal 2015;30:159-162. http://dx.doi.org/10.7180/kmj.2015.30.2.159 KMJ Case Report Post-traumatic tricuspid regurgitation with anterior papillary muscle rupture, corrected by papillary muscle reimplantation

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Post-traumatic tricuspid regurgitation with anterior papillary muscle rupture, corrected by papillary muscle reimplantation

A 47-year-old man presented with complaints of chest pain and dyspnea caused by deceleration injury due to an automobile accident. Systolic cardiac murmur was audible at the right sternal border. An electrocardiogram showed sinus tachycardia. Transthoracic echocardiography revealed a flailing anterior leaflet of the tricuspid valve, papillary muscle rupture, and severe valve insufficiency. Rupture of papillary muscle of the anterior leaflet and chordae tendineae of the posterior leaflet were confirmed by right atrial incision under routine cardiopulmonary bypass. Artificial chordae tendineaes were implanted between the anterior and posterior leaflet and papillary muscles in the right ventricles. De-Vega annuloplasty was also added. This is a very rare case in which a surgery was done for tricuspid valve regurgitation caused by post-traumatic papillary muscle rupture.

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Repair of Ruptured Papillary Muscle of the Tricuspid Valve as a Cause of Tricuspid Insufficiency Following Blunt Chest Trauma

Background: Primary cardiac tumors are extremely rare. The most common type are benign myxomas, and these are almost completely curable with early surgery. Malignant tumors, however, such as sarcomas, are difficult to remove surgically, and their prognosis is known to be poor. In this study, data on patients who had undergone surgical treatment of cardiac tumor in the authors’ hospital were collected and analyzed. Material and Method: The subjects included 28 patients who had undergone surgical treatment of cardiac tumor from August 1993 to December 2008. Their medical records were reviewed and retrospectively analyzed. Result: The patients were aged from 20 to 76 years (mean age: 54.2±15.6), and 11 were male (39%) and 17 female (61%). Fifteen of them (54%) underwent emergency surgery to improve heart failure symptoms. The most common preoperative symptom was dyspnea (15 cases, 54%). Preoperative echocardiography was performed on all the patients. The average size of the tumor as measured during the operation was 7.0±6.9 ㎝ (the average length of the long axis was 2~40 ㎝), and the sites of tumor attachment were the interatrial septum (18 cases, 64%), the left atrium (9 cases, 32%), the mitral valve annulus (2 cases, 7%), and the left ventricle (2 cases, 7%). The operation was performed with an incision through both atria in all the patients, and a complete excision was made in 25 cases (89%). According to the biopsy results, there were 4 cases of sarcoma (14%), 1 case of lipoma (4%), and 23 cases of myxoma (82%). The three cases in which the tumors were not completely excised were sarcomas. No operative deaths occurred after the operations. Outpatient follow-up was possible for 24 cases (86%), with a mean follow-up period of 46.8±42.7 months. Late death occurred in 3 of the 24 patients; each of these patients had sarcomas. Of these patients, the first had undergone two repeat surgeries, the second had metastatic sites removed, and the last had only chemotherapy. The average recurrence time was 12.7±10.8 months, and the average metastasis time was 20.5±16.8 months. Conclusion: Most cardiac tumors are benign myxomas. In principle, they should be surgically treated because they can create risks such as embolism, and can be radically treated when surgically removed. In most cases, however, malignant sarcomas are already considerably advanced with severe infiltration into the neighboring tissues at the time of diagnosis. The surgical removal of malignant sarcomas is known to be difficult because of the advanced stage and degree of infiltration. We suggest that excision of the removable portion of the tumor sites to alleviate symptoms such as heart failure can improve quality of life.

Clinical Experience of the Surgical Treatment of Cardiac Tumor

Infection of both native and prosthetic vessels in the groin is a very serious disease because of recurrent arterial rupture and sepsis, which can cause death. The successful treatment of groin infection, including infection of the femoral artery, requires extensive excision of the infected tissues and restoration of the circulation where the infected area is isolated. Here we describe a case of obturator bypass in a patient with infected femoral artery rupture that occurred after extracorporeal membrane oxygenation for myocarditis and severe heart failure. (Korean J Thorac Cardiovasc Surg 2010;43:312-315)

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Obturator Bypass Surgery in a Patient with an Infected Femoral Artery Rupture after Performed ECMO: A case report

Background: Diagnosing chronic pulmonary embolism at an early stage is difficult because of the patient’s nonspecific symptoms. This condition is not prevalent in Korea, and in fact, there have been only a few case reports on this in the Korean medical literature. We analyzed the surgical outcome of performing pulmonary thromboendarterectomy in patients with chronic pulmonary embolism. Material and Method: The study subjects included those patients who underwent surgery for chronic pulmonary embolism from 1996 to 2008. For making the diagnosis, echocardiography, chest CT and a pulmonary perfusion scan were performed on the patients who complained of chronic dyspnea. Result: Pulmonary endarterectomy was performed as follows: by incision via a mid-sternal approach (7 patients); by incision via a left posterolateral approach (1 patient); using the deep hypothermic circulatory arrest technique (4 patients); under ventricular fibrillation (3 patients); and under cardioplegic arrest (1 patient). The postoperative systolic pulmonary artery blood pressure significantly decreased from a preoperative value of 78.9±14.5 ㎜Hg to 45.6±17.6 ㎜Hg postoperatively (p=0.000). The degree of tricuspid regurgitation was less than grade Ⅱ after surgery. Two patients died early on, including one patient who had persistent pulmonary hypertension without improvement and right heart failure. Conclusion: Patients who have chronic pulmonary embolism are known to have a poor prognosis. However, we think that early surgical treatment along with making the proper diagnosis before the aggravation of right heart failure can help improve the quality of a patient’s life.

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The Clinical Outcome of Pulmonary Thromboendarterectomy for the Treatment of Chronic Pulmonary Thromboembolism

In the treatment of myasthenia gravis, thymectomy is generally accepted as the standard of therapy. For thymectomy, there have been various conventional open approaches including sternal splitting, but recently minimally invasive approaches have been increasingly applied. A 28-year-old man presenting with weakness of both hands and fatigability was diagnosed as having myasthenia gravis with thymic hyperplasia. He underwent a robot-assisted thymectomy with the ‘da Vinci’ surgical system. Through the right thoracic cavity, two thirds of the thymic gland was dissected, and the remainder was resected through the left; these procedures took, respectively, 1 hour and 30 minutes. The patient was discharged on the 8th postoperative day without complications. The minimally invasive approach with the ‘da Vinci’ surgical system is emerging as a popular choice and various advantages have been reported. Here we report the first successful case of robot-assisted thymectomy.

Pill Jo Choi

Papers

Repair of Ruptured Papillary Muscle of the Tricuspid Valve as a Cause of Tricuspid Insufficiency Following Blunt Chest Trauma

Clinical Experience of the Surgical Treatment of Cardiac Tumor

Obturator Bypass Surgery in a Patient with an Infected Femoral Artery Rupture after Performed ECMO: A case report

The Clinical Outcome of Pulmonary Thromboendarterectomy for the Treatment of Chronic Pulmonary Thromboembolism

Robot-assisted Thymectomy with the 'da Vinci' Surgical System in a Patient with Myasthenia Gravis