ANGIOCARDIOGRAPHY IN CYANOTIC CONGENITAL HEART DISEASE BY

Radiological examination of the heart has been practised from the earliest introduction of X-rays and gradually the importance of radioscopy, including the right and left oblique views, has gained ground as a valuable method of distinguishing the different chambers of the heart. In this country the method has been developed and applied largely by the teaching of Parkinson (1933 and 1936). As early as 1931 Forssmann thought of the additional help that could be obtained in outlining the cavities of the heart after injecting opaque media by catheter. Laubry et al. (1935) injected hearts post-mortem and published some beautiful illustrations of the normal anatomy that found a useful basis for comparison with subsequent angiocardiograms. They showed the U-shaped right side and the window between the descending limb, formed by the right auricle, and the ascending limb, formed by the outflow tract of the right ventricle, with the right ventricle itself forming the horizontal base, and the right branch of the pulmonary artery an upper cross-bar. In 1938 Castellanos, Pereiras, and Garcia showed some good angiocardiograms of children with congenital heart disease. They demonstrated the normal U-shaped curve of the right side, the window between the right, auricle and the outflow tract of the right ventricle, and th