Chronic cardiac compression (chronic constrictive pericarditis); a critical study of sixty-one operated cases with follow-up

Sixty-one patients with chronic cardiac compression were studied critically, the largest series in the literature. All patients had pericardiectomy performed. The operative mortality was 18 per cent. Satisfactory result was obtained 72.1 per cent of the patients operated. Tuberculosis was the cause in 28.2 per cent. In most of the remaining cases the etiology was obscure. The symptoms, physical signs, and laboratory examinations are reported. The physiologic studies after operation demonstrate improved cardiac filling and emptying. The importance of diagnosis and the desirability of pericardiectomy are stressed. With antibiotic therapy there is less risk in operating patients with active infection and the compression syndrome.