The abdominal organs are then moved from the chest cavity back into the abdominal cavity where they belong. Occasionally due to swelling there may not be sufficient room in the abdomen to safely close the incision. In this case, something called a silo is used. The organs are kept sterile in a bag just outside of the abdomen. It's wrapped with a dressing so don't worry, it's not scary. It's basically making an extension of the abdominal space. The silo is held securely in place by a bar secured into the bed (see the white arch thing in the picture?)
Then comes the actual repair. On rare occasion, the defect is minor enough that the hole can be repaired with only stitches. Most often, however, a patch is required to fill in the space of the defect.
The defect will not grow as the child grows. Therefore, the patch should not have to ever be replaced as the child ages. The exception is a repeat surgery in rare cases where the patch becomes disconnected and must be reattached (if this happens it's usually within 24 hours of surgery).
**BE AWARE**
The surgery does not fix the problem. It may seem backward, but simply moving the organs back to their proper place does not make everything instantly better. Because of the severely stunted lung development, the real problem CDH babies encounter have to do with the respiratory system.
Moving the bowel out of the chest cavity allows the lungs to have space to inflate, but if their development was impeded enough, having space won't matter. FUNCTION OF LUNG IS MORE IMPORTANT THAN AMOUNT OF LUNG.
