Dextrocardia: practical clinical points and comments on terminology.

Dextrocardia is defined by the authors as a right-sided heart with a base-apex axis directed rightward, resulting from a variation in cardiac development, and not used as a general term indicating any heart in the right chest. Dextrocardia occurs in approximately 0.01% of live births and can be discovered in various clinical settings and at various patient ages. The authors review their experience with dextrocardia, discuss useful clinical points that aid in evaluating complex anatomy, recount the history of dextrocardia terminology, and note the current inconsistent nomenclature.