Anaesthetic management of a prematurely born infant with Cantrell's pentalogy.

Cantrell's pentalogy (CP) is a rare congenital syndrome combining a defect of the supraumbilical abdominal wall, the agenesis of the lower part of the sternum and of the anterior portion of the diaphragm, the absence of the diaphragmatic part of the pericardium, and a cardiac malformation. It was first described by Cantrell in 1958 (1,2). We report the case of a prematurely born infant with CP and Wolff-Parkinson-White (WPW) syndrome who required surgery first for bilateral inguinal hernia repair and later for Blalock-Taussig shunt. During these two procedures, our anaesthetic plan was to preserve the fragile equilibrium of both the pulmonary and the cardiovascular systems.