Dutta Nilanjan, Das Debasis, Chakraborty Unmesh, Das Shubhadeep, Sharma Manish Kumar, Gajpal Shivani, Chattopadhyay Amitabha, Ghosh Sanjiban, Das Jayita Nandy
Department of Cardiac Surgery, Narayana Superspeciality Hospital, Howrah, West Bengal, India.
Department of Pediatric Cardiac Intensive Care, Narayana Superspeciality Hospital, Howrah, West Bengal, India.
Ann Pediatr Cardiol. 2023 Sep-Oct;16(5):378-380. doi: 10.4103/apc.apc_136_23. Epub 2024 Apr 1.
We report a unique intraoperative finding of an additional double left atrial appendage (LAA) during an arterial switch operation with ventricular septal defect closure in a 4-month-old girl. Immediately after the procedure, a prolapsing mass within the left atrium (LA) on the transesophageal echocardiogram raised concerns of a possible thrombus. The LAA was clearly visible with a pressure monitoring line which was put intraoperatively. To investigate further, cardiopulmonary bypass was resumed, and the heart was arrested and explored. There was an appendage-like structure, separate from the one that had the pressure monitoring line, which was inverted inside. It was pulled out from outside clearly establishing a double LAA. This report illustrates an example of a diagnostic dilemma caused by a double atrial appendage which was invaginated into LA masquerading as a mass or thrombus.