Cardiopulmonary Bypass Strategy for a Cyanotic Child With Hemoglobin SC Disease

Outcomes of Patients with Sickle Cell Disease and Trait Following Congenital Heart Disease Surgery

BACKGROUND

Sickle cell disease (SCD) is a hemoglobinopathy which can cause multi-organ dysfunction. The objective of our paper was to assess the perioperative outcomes of patients undergoing surgery for congenital heart disease who had either SCD or sickle cell trait (SCT).

METHODS

We performed a retrospective review of patients with SCD and SCT who had records in the Society of Thoracic Surgeons Congenital Heart Surgery Database between 2014 and 2019. The primary outcome was operative mortality; secondary outcomes included post-operative complications. One-to-one propensity score matching was performed between the SCD and SCT groups and the control group for further analysis.

RESULTS

Our study population consisted of 73, 411, and 36501 patients in the SCD, SCT, and control groups respectively. Median age at surgery in years (25-75% interquartile range) was 2.8(0.4, 9.7), 0.60(0.2, 3.1), and 0.70(0.2, 6.4) years in the SCD, SCT, and control cohort respectively. Operative mortality, surgery duration, cardiopulmonary bypass time, and cross clamp time were not significantly different among the three groups. The SCD group had a higher rate of post-surgical cardiac arrest than its propensity score matched control group (5.5% vs 0%, p<0.05); otherwise there were no statistically significant differences in the outcomes between the SCD and SCT groups and their respective matched control groups.

CONCLUSIONS

Operative mortality following cardiothoracic procedures in patients with SCD and SCT appeared similar to our control patients. While these patients may require unique peri-operative management, they can undergo cardiac surgery without an observed increase in mortality.

Perioperative care of children with sickle cell disease: A systematic review and clinical recommendations

Children with sickle cell disease (SCD) require specific perioperative care, and clinical practice in this area remains poorly defined. We aimed to conduct a systematic, PRISMA-based review of the literature, available clinical guidelines and practice recommendations. We also aimed to extract any valuable information for the "best of available-evidence"-based prevention of perioperative adverse events in children with SCD, and highlight the most urgent priorities in clinical research. As data sources, US National Library of Medicine, Medline, National Guideline Clearinghouse, International Guideline Network, TRIP databases were searched for any content until January 2019. We also included institutional, consortia and expert group guidelines. Included were reports/guidelines in English, French, German, and Italian. Excluded were reports on obstetrical and fetal management. We identified 202 reports/guidelines fulfilling the criteria outlined above. A majority focused on visceral, cardiovascular and orthopedic surgery procedures, and only five were multicenter randomized controlled trials and two prospective randomized studies. After grading of the quality of the evidence, the extracted data was summarized into clinical recommendations for daily practice. Additionally, we designed a risk-grading algorithm to identify contexts likely to be associated with adverse outcomes. In conclusion, we provide a systematic PRISMA-based review of the existing literature and ancillary practice and delineate a set of clinical recommendations and priorities for research.