A full-term newborn arrived with an unusual pattern of blue skin. The bluish tint showed up on the right arm, the right side of the chest wall, and the right upper abdominal wall, rather than on the legs, where this kind of oxygen split usually shows. The baby's blood vessels were sending oxygen-poor blood to one side of the upper body.
The case, from physicians at The Hospital for Sick Children (SickKids) and the University of Toronto, was published this spring in JACC: Case Reports. Imaging revealed a rare arrangement of the body's main artery, called a circumflex retroesophageal left aortic arch, along with not one but two open fetal blood vessels. Surgery corrected the problem, and the blue discoloration resolved.
