ABSTRACT
The care of the pediatric surgical patient can be a daunting task, both technically and clinically. To paraphrase, as many others have, ‘‘children are not little adults.’’ Specifically, congenital anomalies, differences in nutritional requirements, thermoregulation and energy expenditure, and continued maturation of specific organ systems result in a continuum of constant changes in these patients. Additionally, the management of neonatal patients is immensely complex and, in most aspects, altogether different. Successful management requires a complete understanding of the normal physiologic and anatomic differences in relation to the pathophysiology, and leaves little room for error. Driven by these physiologic differences and the breadth of disease processes seen in this population, pediatric surgery has, over the last century, matured into a surgical subspecialty.
