Cardiac arrhythmias in Egyptian infants and children: an etiologic study

ABSTRACT

113 Egyptian infants and children aged between 6 days and 13 years were studied for the type and cause of cardiac arrhythmias they developed. Supraventricular arrhythmias were found in 38.9% of cases, conduction disorders in 51.3% and ventricular arrhythmias in 21.2% of cases. Supraventricular tachycardia was the commonest being found in 30.1% of patients followed by the first and second degree atrioventricular blocks which constituted 24.8% of all cases. About 36.3% of all arrhythmias were idiopathic and 55.8% of patients had abnormal hearts. The commonest cardiac lesions detected were congenital heart defects [31.9% of cases] and rheumatic carditis and rheumatic heart disease [10.6% of cases] followed by cardiomyopathy [7.1%] and myocarditis [6.2%]. Cardiac surgery for congenital heart disease appeared to be an important cause of cardiac arrhythmias being responsible for about 14.2% of arrhythmias in the patients