Over the course of the past 4 decades, the survival of patients with the Fontan circulation has improved and today they often present for noncardiac surgery anesthesia care. In patients with the Fontan circulation, pulmonary blood flow is passive and anesthetic management is directed at reducing pulmonary vascular resistance and maintaining adequate cardiac output. One-lung ventilation can have unfavorable effects on the Fontan circulation due to hypoxia, hypercarbia, and increased airway pressure. We present a case of successful one-lung ventilation in a patient with the Fontan circulation and describe the perioperative anesthetic management.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.