Penetrating Cardiac Injuries (An Analysis of 66 Cases)

During a 10 year period ending in July 1988, 66 patients with cardiac injury were operated at the department of Cardiovascular Surgery at Cukurova University, Faculty of Medicine. Sixtythree patients (95.45%) were male. Their ages ranged between 13 and 59 years. Fifty-four patients (81.81%) had stab wounds and nine (13.63%) gunshot wounds. Three patients (4.54%) had blunt trauma. Thirteen patients (16.69%) were in the terminal stage, 37 patints (56.60%) were in a shock state and 16 patients were hemodynamically stable (24.04%) upon hospitalization. Thirty-two patients (48.48%) had evidence of cardiac tamponade and 18 patients (22.27%) were in hemorrhagic shock at the initial examination. Overall mortality was 16.66 percent(11/66). Four of 54 patients (7.40%) with stab wounds died in comparison to 5 out of 9 patients (55.55%) with gunshot wounds (P<0.05). Mortality for the patients in terminal stage was 30.76 percent (4/13) and 13.51 percent (5/37) for those in shock stage. On the other hand, mortality rate in patients with cardiac tamponade was 9.37 percent (3/32) and 33.93 percent (6/18) for the patients with hemorrhagic shock (P<0.05).