Caractérisation des lymphopénies post-chirurgies cardiaques de type Fontan
The thymectomy is a surgical procedure often done during cardiac surgery. It is well known that the resection of the thymus can cause alterations of lymphocyte subpopulations without major clinical consequences. This lymphopenia could be more pronounced in patients who undergone a cardiac surgery named "Fontan". Nevertheless, it is not known if these alterations are due to the thymectomy or this specific type of cardiac surgery. We recruited 19 patients with Fontan surgery and compared them to 6 patients who had a cardiac surgery of another type. Our results show decreased CD4+ and CD8+ naive T cells populations and more specifically, low numbers of thymic emigrants (CD45RA+CD31+/CD4+). Expansion of memory repertoire (CD45RO+) is also noted. These findings are also found in the control group.  Thus, perturbations of T cells populations seem to be related to the thymectomy rather than the type of cardiac surgery. Infections were more severe in the Fontan group but they can be explained by an unfavourable post-operative evolution in this group of patients.
Fontan lymphocytes lymphopenia thymectomy thymic emigrants cardiac surgery