Spontaneous closure of ventricular septal defects.

SYSTOLIC MURMURS heard during the first year of life in apparently healthy children are commonly noted to have disappeared at a later examination." 2 The exact origin of such murmurs is not known but it has been suggested that some are accounted for by exaggeration of the physiologic pulmonary systolic murmur and a few by late closure of the ductus arteriosus. Of particular interest is a small group of patients in whom a confident clinical diagnosis of ventricular septal defect was made at the initial examination on the basis of the site and quality of the murmur, yet as the child grew the murmur diminished and ultimately disappeared completely. The results of special investigations in a few of the patients support the cLinical impression that these murmurs arise from a ventricular septal defect that closes spontaneously.