A 70-year-old woman underwent surgery by the Cardiac Surgery Department for a complex valve problem. She presented with multiple post-surgical complications that aggravated her general condition due to pump failure. After two weeks of hospitalisation, she began to develop septic symptoms originating in the mediastinum. The surgical wound was opened, with exposure of the heart, and daily dressings with physiological saline solution. Two weeks after the first operation, the cardiac surgery team performed an omentum flap to repair the defect, without success. Two months after admission, the patient was still in the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) with assisted ventilatory support, drug-induced coma and had developed generalised polyneuropathy; extensive exposure of the heart, with opening of the pleura in both hemithoraxes and herniation of a left pulmonary lobe with respiratory movements. It was decided to perform reconstruction using a latissimus dorsi flap and alloplastic material (Gore-tex®) to repair the central defect and pulmonary herniation. Part of the previously performed omentum flap was used to cover the defect. The patient evolved favourably, her neurological condition improved gradually and she was transferred to the ward 18 days later, to be discharged home one month after the operation. The patient died 6 months later from pneumonia affecting the right lung.