Clinicodemographic profile and outcomes of congenital diaphragmatic hernia with sac: experience of a paediatric referral centre.

Introduction: Congenital diaphragmatic hernia, in which viscera herniate into the thoracic cavity, is one of the common causes of onset of respiratory distress in neonates and children. Developmentally they may have a sac in rare cases.

Aim: To analyse the clinical profile and the outcome of congenital diaphragmatic hernia with a sac in neonates and children in a paediatric referral centre.

Material and methods: All surgically repaired patients with a congenital diaphragmatic hernia with sac, admitted and treated over a period of sixteen years from January 2005 to December 2021 in a tertiary care referral neonatal and paediatric centre, were included in this study. Forty-three children including neonates were analysed by their clinical characteristics, risk factors and mode of surgical interventions. Congenital diaphragmatic eventration and diaphragmatic hernial defects were excluded from this study.

Results: Forty-three study subjects were grouped into two groups for clinical and statistical analysis, based on their pre-operative and intra-operative findings as well their final diagnosis. Cases of left-sided congenial diaphragmatic hernia with sac (LCDHS) were included in group I (n = 30) and cases of right-sided congenital diaphragmatic hernia with sac (RCDHS) were included in group II (n = 13). Each group was further subclassified into A, B, C according to the age of presentation and side of the lesion in order to determine the prognosis in each subgroup. Level of evidence IV.

Conclusions: Mere awareness and clinical suspicion of such a rare embryological defect - a congenital diaphragmatic hernia with sac - from the attending clinicians can improve the prognosis of affected babies, avoiding morbid consequences if referred early to a tertiary care paediatric and neonatal centre.