A new and successful chance in surgical treatment of gastrooesophageal reflux in severely neurologically impaired children: Bianchi's procedure

Aim: Neurologically impaired (NI) children present with neuromuscular incoordination and severe gastroesophageal reflux (GER). In these cases, Bianchi has proposed total oesophagogastric dissociation (OGD) as a primary procedure and not only after failed fundoplication. Methods: Anthropometric and laboratory data, incidence of respiratory symptoms, days of hospitalization, time of feeding, stool frequency and quality of life were tested preoperatively and after OGD over a 12-month period in 13 severe NI patients. Results: Results are shown in Table 1. We also recorded improvement in quality of life, based on communication by the person responsible for the care of the subject, and determined by psychological interviews. Conclusions: OGD is a successful and feasible procedure and can be included as a primary definitive surgical treatment in individualized nutritional rehabilitation planning for each severe NI child.