Repair of a bilateral Morgagni hernia in a premature, extremely low birth weight infant

Abstract

Congenital diaphragmatic hernias (CDH) are rare congenital anomalies occurring in 1:5000 live births with a wide range of clinical presentations. The Morgagni hernia is the rarest of these defects with the hernia presenting anteriorly, most commonly on the right. Factors found to predict mortality in infants presenting with CDH include prenatal diagnosis, early gestational age, low birth weight, large diaphragmatic defect, associated congenital anomalies, and low APGAR scores. We present the case of a 27-week gestational age premature girl weighing 460 g who required urgent repair of a Morgagni diaphragmatic hernia and a review of the current literature on the topic. To the best of our knowledge, this is the smallest infant to undergo repair of this CDH reported to date.