Acute alterations of the electrocardiogram following thoracic surgery.

While occurrence of disturbances of cardiac rhythm during and after general surgical procedures has been known for many years 11 interest in the subject was revived only recently with the advent of thoracic and in particular cardiac surgery. A number of reports dealing with postoperative changes of the electrocardiogram have appeared, mostly after pulmonary resection.’ ‘ ‘ 13. 1i Various arrhythmias have been noted postoperatively often associated with transient surgical pericarditis and diverse factors have been implicated in their development.3’ “ ‘ #{176}‘ ‘7 In the course of our own observations we have been impressed by the high incidence of arrhythmias developing in patients undergoing surgery for carcinoma of the esophagus, a point previously not stressed. Furthermore, a characteristic electrocardiographic pattern was found consistently in our patients who developed surgical pericarditis after mitral commissurotomy. These two features as well as the incidence and analysis of the causes of disturbances of rhythm in our entire patient material submitted to thoracic and cardiac surgery are the subject of the present report. Changes in electrocardiographic contour attributable to the surgical trauma of the heart itself and to hemodynamic alterations following surgical procedures for the correction of congenital heart disease are at present under study.