Atresia of left atrioventricular orifice. Anatomical investigation in 62 cases.

Sixty-two hearts without a patent exit from the left atrium to the ventricular mass have been studied. All had situs solitus and laevocardia. The material consisted of 32 cases with coexistent aortic atresia and 30 cases with patent aortic root. Five hearts with aortic atresia were biventricular with atrioventricular concordance and imperforate left atrioventricular valves, and 27 hearts were univentricular of right ventricular type, with absent left atrioventricular connection. The anatomy of this group was uniform, with extreme hypoplasia of all the left cardiac segments. Among the cases with patent aortic root, five were biventricular, with atrioventricular concordance and imperforate left atrioventricular valves, and 24 had absent left atrioventricular connection, 15 with univentricular heart of right ventricular type and nine with univentricular heart of left ventricular type. The final heart had double inlet univentricular of left ventricular type with an imperforate left atrioventricular valve. In this second group the aorta was larger in cases with discordant ventriculoarterial connection or in those with double outlet from the main ventricular chamber. A normal sized aorta without aortic arch obstruction was observed in nine instances. These are of great interest in terms of surgical anatomy since definitive palliation may be feasible.