Background

Constrictive pericarditis (CP) is an uncommon disease that limits both cardiac relaxation and contraction. Patients often present with right-sided heart failure as the pericardium thickens and impedes cardiac filling. Pericardiectomy is the treatment of choice for improving hemodynamics in CP patients; however, the procedure carries a high morbidity and mortality, and the anesthetic management can be challenging. Acute heart failure, bleeding and arrhythmias are all concerns postoperatively.

Methods

After IRB approval, we performed the retrospective analysis of 66 consecutive patients with CP who underwent pericardiectomy from July 2018 to May 2022.

Results

Most patients had significant preoperative comorbidities, including congestive hepatopathy (75.76%), New York Heart Association Type III/IV heart failure (59.09%) and atrial fibrillation (51.52%). Despite this, 75.76% of patients were extubated within the first 24 h and all but 2 of the patients survived to discharge (96.97%).

Conclusions

Anesthetic management, including a thorough understanding of the pathophysiology of CP, the use of advanced monitoring and transesophageal echocardiography (TEE) guidance, all played an important role in patient outcomes.