The Nation - News from Dec. 27, 1988

People who underwent surgery early in life to correct one of two congenital heart defects can expect nearly the same longevity as persons born without those abnormalities, two Mayo Clinic studies published in the American Heart Assn.’s journal “Circulation” and reprinted by the association show. The studies tracked about 300 patients who underwent one of the two operations between 1956 and 1967 at the Rochester, Minn., clinic. A study of 191 patients in whom the narrowing of the pulmonary valve was repaired by a pulmonary valvotomy found that those who had the operation before age 21 had long-term survival similar to the general population. Research on 123 patients who had surgery to correct a hole in the wall that separates the two upper chambers of the heart showed that long-term survival is no different from the general population for those younger than 18 at the time of surgery.