Successful percutaneous balloon valvuloplasty in a preterm infant weighing 1500 g with critical pulmonary valve stenosis

We describe a successful cardiac intervention in an infant, born at 32 weeks of gestation, with a birth weight of 1040 g, who had a critical pulmonary valve stenosis with the right ventricular pressure twice the systemic pressure. Continuous prostaglandin E infusion kept the arterial duct open and at the age of four weeks and a weight of 1500 g a balloon valvuloplasty was performed, which reduced the systolic right ventricular pressure to below the systemic pressure. Two weeks later the procedure was repeated because of increasing right ventricular pressure. At two months of age the mean systolic transpulmonary Doppler gradient was 30 mmHg with an adequate right ventricular volume. The neurological status of the infant was normal and the femoral vein was patent. Timely interventional heart catheterisation is a successful method of treatment in critical pulmonary valve stenosis in infants with a low birth weight. (Neth Heart J 2008;16:264-6.)