From 1974 through 1989, 36 patients with arteriovenous malformations were studied in the neurosurgical department of the Santobono Children's Hospital in Naples; 7 of these patients were younger than three years of age: 5 underwent surgery. The remaining 2 patients presented, respectively, an aneurysm of the vein of Galen and an arteriovenous malformation of the brain stem. Improvements in surgical and anesthesiological techniques allow to treat lesions considered as not amenable to surgery until recent years, with minimal occurrence of preoperative and postoperative complication and a significant amelioration of prognosis.