Endovascular stenting as an emergency treatment for neonatal coarctation

We describe a neonate with critical coarctation of the aorta. Since treatme nt with Prostaglandin E1 had failed to reopen the arterial duct, and surger y was deemed to be associated with an unacceptably high risk in this unstab le neonate, it was decided to perform balloon dilation of the coarctation a s a palliative procedure to stabilize the patient. Balloon angioplasty fail ed to reduce the pressure gradient across the coarctation, so a stent was i mplanted retrogradely as an emergency procedure. Subsequently, the stented segment was resected surgically and end-to-end anastomosis created without complications at sc-yen months of age.