A 76-year-old male with a past medical history of hypertension, hypercholesterolemia, hypothyroidism, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, diabetes mellitus type two, obstructive sleep apnea, benign prostatic hyperplasia, cerebral vascular accident with residual right-sided weakness, and dextrocardia with situs inversus presented with an abnormal nuclear stress test. Additionally, he had a family history notable for colon cancer and myocardial infarction in his mother and a thrombotic event in his father. He had no history of significant alcohol use, tobacco use, or illicit drug use, and his past surgical interventions were not cardiovascular in nature. He originally presented at an outside hospital following a syncopal event with a 45-second loss of consciousness postmicturition. At the time, he was thought to have orthostatic hypotension, and his tamsulosin was discontinued. He also underwent a nuclear stress test for the syncopal event due to additional complaints of worsening dyspnea on exertion. Nuclear stress testing demonstrated a moderate-sized reversible anterior wall myocardial perfusion defect and a moderate-sized reversible inferolateral wall myocardial perfusion defect. He was transferred to our hospital for further evaluation of symptoms and possible left heart catheterization. Cardiac catheterization revealed the already diagnosed dextrocardia along with a new diagnosis of severe ostial left anterior descending (LAD), mid-LAD, and ostial diagonal coronary artery disease. Transthoracic echocardiography (TTE) showed trace mitral valve regurgitation, mild aortic valve regurgitation, and an ejection fraction of 60%. His underlying dextrocardia with situs inversus caused diagnostic challenge with these tests as his angiographic, radiologic, and echocardiographic images were mirror images of normal cardiac anatomy. Aggressive risk factor modification was initiated, and a consult was placed to cardiothoracic surgery for evaluation for potential coronary artery bypass grafting (CABG). He underwent three-vessel CABG on day 7 of his hospitalization with alterations in management to account for his known dextrocardia with situs inversus. The electrocardiography leads and defibrillator pads were placed in reverse orientation. A left internal jugular vein central venous catheter was placed to provide direct access to the right atrium rather than standard right-sided central venous access. The arterial line was placed in the right radial artery as opposed to the institutional standard left radial artery to accommodate for the position of the surgeon during the operation. Transesophageal echocardiography (TEE) evaluation again confirmed dextrocardia (). To obtain standardly recognized TEE images, the omniplane was adjusted to 180° for the midesophageal four-chamber view. By subtracting 60°, 90°, and 120°, midesophageal midcommissural, two-chamber, and long-axis views were then obtained. Additionally, TEE confirmation of aortic and venous cannulation required turning the probe right for the right-sided aorta and left for liver visualization, respectively. Aside from these alterations in approach, induction, intubation, and anesthetic management were conducted in normal fashion and were uneventful. He remained intubated and was taken to a cardiac intensive care unit postoperatively. A thorough sign-out was given to the intensive care unit staff to ensure understanding of his anatomy and intraoperative course. He was weaned from the ventilator and extubated on postoperative day 1 and transferred to the step-down unit on postoperative day 2. His postoperative course was complicated by urinary retention and an elevation in creatinine that trended down prior to discharge. He was discharged home in stable condition with a urinary catheter in place on postoperative day 6 that was to be removed as an outpatient. Both the patient and the responsible physicians were satisfied with the successful outcome.
A 23-year-old male patient has morbid obesity with a weight of 146.3 kg and a height of 177 cm. The calculated body mass index (BMI) was 46.7 kg/m2. The patient had previously failed to lose weight using different dietary and lifestyle modification techniques over an approximately four years period. He provided a history of dextrocardia, bronchiectasis, and chronic sinusitis with no recent flare in the last three months. He denied any history of previous surgery, smoking or alcohol consumption. He elected to have LSG to help with weight reduction.\nThe patient was evaluated by a multidisciplinary bariatric surgery team, cardiology, pulmonology, and anesthesiology. He was cleared for the planned surgery. A full assessment was conducted preoperatively including physical exam, complete blood count, biochemical profile, thyroid function test, electrocardiogram, and pulmonary function test (PFT). Additionally, imaging studies including chest x-ray, transthoracic echocardiogram, ultrasound of abdomen, computed tomography (CT) scan of sinuses, chest, abdomen, and pelvis were performed. His blood workup was normal, the electrocardiogram revealed right axis deviation (Figure ), and his radiological imaging showed evidence of SIT (Figures , -). His echocardiogram was normal except for dextrocardia and he had mild restrictive airway disease on PFT. Evidence of chronic sinusitis was seen on his sinuses CT and his chest CT showed radiological features of SI and bronchiectasis (Figure ).\nHe was admitted the night before surgery per pulmonology recommendation for preoperative monitoring. LSG was performed with the patient in the reverse Trendelenburg and French position (split-leg supine). The surgeon stood between the legs. The abdomen was accessed using veress needle technique inserted in the right upper quadrant at a mirror image of the palmer’s point after infiltration of local anesthesia. Pneumoperitoneum was achieved successfully and was maintained at 13 mmHg of intra-abdominal pressure. The veress needle was then removed and a 5-mm optical trocar was placed in the left lumbar region of the abdomen about 10-15 cm below the costal margin to avoid injuring the malpositioned liver. This was done under direct visualization using a 5 mm/zero-degree laparoscopic camera. Diagnostic laparoscopy revealed that all abdominal organs were in reverse orientation (Figure ). The spleen was located in the right hypochondriac region. The gastric fundus and its greater curvature were found under the hepatic portion located to the right of the falciform ligament. Toward the left side, in the left hypochondriac region, the gallbladder was found under the hepatic portion located to the left of the falciform ligament. Other trocars were adapted to the new position (5 mm, 10 mm, 15 mm, and 12 mm) as shown in Figure . Using blunt tip LigaSure 5 mm-37 cm device, the dissection of omentum from great curvature was done starting 4 cm from pyloric sphincter, dissection of the short gastric vessel was done safely. GIA staplers (Covidien 60 mm one black cartilage and four purples) were used to resize the stomach using intragastric bougie of 36 Fr size. Suture line clipping was done to control oozing from the staple line using 5 mm clips. A Penrose drain was inserted at the end of the procedure. No leak test was done as part of our protocol for all LSG. Estimated blood loss at the end of the surgery was less than 100 mL. Removal of the stomach stump was done through the 15 mm port incision. Evacuation of pneumoperitoneum was done gradually and skin was closed with 4-0 vicryl subcticular stitches. Local anesthesia was infiltrated at the port incisions in the end. The total duration of the operation was 68 minutes, patient was extubated uneventfully and moved to the recovery room for monitoring.\nNo early surgical or anesthetic complications were reported during or after the operation. The patient started the bariatric clear liquid diet on postoperative day 1 and he was discharged home on postoperative day 2 after removing the drain. He was readmitted after two months postoperatively due to renal colic that resolved with non-operative management. He was on a full bariatric diet by then and he lost a total of 29.3 kg with his readmission weight measured at 117 kg. He continued to do well and showing good progress with his weight loss. His postoperative weight at one year was 88 Kg with a BMI of 28.1 kg/m2.\nLiterature review\nA broad search of the published English-language medical literature utilizing Pubmed, Google Scholar, and Web of Science search engines for articles about LSG for weight loss in SI patients was performed. The following keywords were used: “obesity,” “morbid obesity,” “situs,” “situs inversus,” “gastrectomy,” “sleeve gastrectomy,” and “bariatric surgery.” The search included all articles from 1998 to May 2020. After a thorough screening, a total of 17 studies were found with 18 reported cases. Furthermore, we present a case on the same topic.\nKey information extracted and summarized in Table including our case. All cases had SIT except one case that had SI partials [] and another that had situs ambiguous []. Four cases had Kartagener syndrome [-]. One case had a planned additional procedure [] and another had an unplanned additional procedure []. Multiple port sites were used except for one case that utilized a single incision LSG technique []. Additional ports were needed in two cases [,] with four cases missing that information [,,]. French position used nine times [,,,-]. The primary surgeon stood between the legs in eight cases [,,-], to the left of the patient in six cases [,,,,] and to the right in three cases [,,]. The surgeon position was missing in two cases [,]. The mean age of cases was ~39 years (range 19-59). The patients were predominantly females (15 females and four males). The mean BMI was 45.9 kg/m2 (range 36-76). The mean operative time was ~75 minutes (range 28-202) but four authors did not report this information [,,,] and Watanabe et al. had a very long operative time due to the additional procedure []. The mean postoperative hospital length of stay was ~3 days (range 1-7) with three articles not reporting the length of stay [,,]. Preoperative workup looked similar between groups with some variations. Most of the cases had obesity-related comorbidities. Five cases had prior surgeries [,,-] with a single article that did not provide surgical history []. Only three cases had a perioperative complication [,,]. Intraoperative spleen infarction was reported by Shaheen et al. of four out of six spleens in a patient with situs ambiguous and polysplenia []. This was recognized during the time of LSG and was successfully resected. Deutsch et al. described a postoperative suture/staple line leak that was managed with endoscopic poly flex stenting []. Mosquera et al. reported upper gastrointestinal bleeding after being discharged from the hospital on postoperative day 5 []. This resolved spontaneously with clinical monitoring without the need for blood product transfusion. All of the cases achieved variable but significant postoperative weight loss. Data on weight loss were lacking in five cases [,,,].