Metabolic effects of corrective surgery in infants and children with congenital heart defects.

We have measured oxygen consumption and carbon dioxide production by indirect calorimetry in 25 infants and children immediately before and after surgical correction of congenital cardiac malformations. Surgical correction of the cardiac defect caused a decrease in oxygen consumption towards normal. Greatly increased oxygen consumption values were observed before surgery in the infants with a large left-to-right intracardiac shunt and heart failure and the highest reduction in metabolic rate, up to 43%, was observed in these infants. The results indicate that corrective surgery for congenital cardiac malformations reduces the load on the cardiopulmonary system immediately after operation.