Systemic or pulmonary venous obstruction. Although systemic or pulmonary venous obstruction is generally a complication that develops during the early postoperative period, it can become a problem in some adult patients born with dextrotransposition of the great arteries. The ARV is located on the left and gives rise to the aorta. Intracardiac anatomy in levotransposition of great arteries with situs solitus. Circulation in these patients is normal.
Deoxygenated blood flows to the lungs and oxygenated blood flows to the rest of the body.
In the absence of additional cardiac defects, these patients may be totally asymptomatic. For example, Nadas and Fyler 7 found such additional defects in 59 of 60 patients who had levotransposition of the great arteries. Patients who do not have one of these associated cardiac defects or have undergone corrective or palliative surgery survive into adulthood. Eventually, heart block, systemic right ventricular failure, and regurgitation by the left atrioventricular valve will develop in the majority of these survivors. More and more patients born with a congenital cardiac defect are surviving into adulthood without surgical intervention or because of corrective or palliative surgery.