Rings, slings, and other things: Vascular compression of the infant trachea updated from the midcentury to the millennium - The legacy of Robert E. Gross, MD, and Edward B. D. Neuhanser, MD

In the first half of the 20th century, pediatric chest imaging was limited mainly to the performance of conventional radiography, including barium eso phagography and occasionally bronchography and angiography. Despite this li mited imaging approach, by 1950 the diagnosis and treatment of vascular "ri ngs" compressing infant airways had been accomplished with the pioneering e fforts of Robert E. Cross, MD, in the field of surgery, and Edward B. D. Ne uhauser, MD, in the field of radiology. The next two decades brought the re cognition of pulmonary arterial "sling," or anomalous left pulmonary artery , in diagnosis and treatment. Recognition of still another vascular compres sive syndrome in infants was identified as that due to the absence of the p ulmonary valve. These "rings, slings, and other things" are now evaluated w ith magnetic resonance (MR) imaging, including MR angiography, and computed tomography (CT), including CT angiography, with the added use of three-dim ensional reconstruction. These are the legacies of Drs Cross and Neuhauser.