Heart Care Info - Heart Disease Prevention & Treatment

Extracorporeal Membrane Oxygenation for Bridge to Heart Transplantation Among Children in the United StatesClinical Perspective

CS Almond, TP Singh, K Gauvreau, GE Piercey... - Circulation, 2011 - Am Heart Assoc BackgroundExtracorporeal membrane oxygenation (ECMO) has served for> 2 decades as the standard of care for US children requiring mechanical support as a bridge to heart transplantation. Objective data on the safety and efficacy of ECMO for this indication are ...

Methods and Results—Data from the Extracorporeal Life Support Organization Registry and the Organ Procurement Transplant Network database were merged to identify children supported with ECMO and listed for heart transplantation from 1994 to 2009. Independent predictors of wait-list and posttransplantation in-hospital mortality were identified. Objective performance goals for ECMO were developed. Of 773 children, the median age was 6 months (interquartile range, 1 to 44 months); 28% had cardiomyopathy; and in 38%, a bridge to transplantation was intended at ECMO initiation. Overall, 45% of subjects reached transplantation, although one third of those transplanted died before discharge; overall survival to hospital discharge was 47%. Wait-list mortality was independently associated with congenital heart disease, cardiopulmonary resuscitation before ECMO, and renal dysfunction. Posttransplantation mortality was associated with congenital heart disease, renal dysfunction, ECMO duration of >14 days, and initial ECMO indication as a bridge to recovery. In the objective performance goal cohort (n=485), patients with cardiomyopathy had the highest survival to hospital discharge (63%), followed by patients with myocarditis (59%), 2-ventricle congenital heart disease (44%) and 1-ventricle congenital heart disease (33%).