Human acardiac anomaly: a report of three cases.

We report on three cases of acardia, all of which had to be classified as acardius anceps. The degree of cardiac malformation ranged between a completely missing heart and a malrotation of a relatively well-developed heart. One fetus showed an intermediate form of cardiac malformation with a hypoplastic cor triloculare. Our findings suggest that the defect in cardiac development may take place at different times in early embryogenesis, resulting in differing degrees of cardiac malformation.