Association of Congenital and Acquired Cardiovascular Conditions With COVID-19 Severity Among Pediatric Patients in the US.

Importance: Identifying the associations between severe COVID-19 and individual cardiovascular conditions in pediatric patients may inform treatment. Objective: To assess the association between previous or preexisting cardiovascular conditions and severity of COVID-19 in pediatric patients. Design, Setting, and Participants: This retrospective cohort study used data from a large, multicenter, electronic health records database in the US. The cohort included patients aged 2 months to 17 years with a laboratory-confirmed diagnosis of COVID-19 or a diagnosis code indicating infection or exposure to SARS-CoV-2 at 85 health systems between March 1, 2020, and January 31, 2021. Exposures: Diagnoses for 26 cardiovascular conditions between January 1, 2015, and December 31, 2019 (before infection with SARS-CoV-2). Main Outcomes and Measures: The main outcome was severe COVID-19, defined as need for supplemental oxygen or in-hospital death. Mixed-effects, random intercept logistic regression modeling assessed the significance and magnitude of associations between 26 cardiovascular conditions and COVID-19 severity. Multiple comparison adjustment was performed using the Benjamini-Hochberg false discovery rate procedure. Results: The study comprised 171 416 pediatric patients; the median age was 8 years (IQR, 2-14 years), and 50.28% were male. Of these patients, 17 065 (9.96%) had severe COVID-19. The random intercept model showed that the following cardiovascular conditions were associated with severe COVID-19: cardiac arrest (odds ratio [OR], 9.92; 95% CI, 6.93-14.20), cardiogenic shock (OR, 3.07; 95% CI, 1.90-4.96), heart surgery (OR, 3.04; 95% CI, 2.26-4.08), cardiopulmonary disease (OR, 1.91; 95% CI, 1.56-2.34), heart failure (OR, 1.82; 95% CI, 1.46-2.26), hypotension (OR, 1.57; 95% CI, 1.38-1.79), nontraumatic cerebral hemorrhage (OR, 1.54; 95% CI, 1.24-1.91), pericarditis (OR, 1.50; 95% CI, 1.17-1.94), simple biventricular defects (OR, 1.45; 95% CI, 1.29-1.62), venous embolism and thrombosis (OR, 1.39; 95% CI, 1.11-1.73), other hypertensive disorders (OR, 1.34; 95% CI, 1.09-1.63), complex biventricular defects (OR, 1.33; 95% CI, 1.14-1.54), and essential primary hypertension (OR, 1.22; 95% CI, 1.08-1.38). Furthermore, 194 of 258 patients (75.19%) with a history of cardiac arrest were younger than 12 years. Conclusions and Relevance: The findings suggest that some previous or preexisting cardiovascular conditions are associated with increased severity of COVID-19 among pediatric patients in the US and that morbidity may be increased among individuals children younger than 12 years with previous cardiac arrest.

Artificial Intelligence in Congenital Heart Disease: Current State and Prospects.

The current era of big data offers a wealth of new opportunities for clinicians to leverage artificial intelligence to optimize care for pediatric and adult patients with a congenital heart disease. At present, there is a significant underutilization of artificial intelligence in the clinical setting for the diagnosis, prognosis, and management of congenital heart disease patients. This document is a call to action and will describe the current state of artificial intelligence in congenital heart disease, review challenges, discuss opportunities, and focus on the top priorities of artificial intelligence-based deployment in congenital heart disease.

Artificial intelligence and COVID-19: Present state and future vision.

The COVID-19 pandemic has lead to catastrophic number of deaths and revealed that much work still remains with data and artificial intelligence. To fully comprehend the dynamics of a pandemic with relevance to artificial intelligence, a primer on global health concepts is first presented. Following this, various aspects of diagnosis and therapy and the relationship to artificial intelligence are presented along with a future projection of an ideal deployment of artificial intelligence in a pandemic. Final thoughts are made about lessons learned and what lies ahead.

The Next Frontier in Pediatric Cardiology: Artificial Intelligence.

Artificial intelligence (AI) in the last decade centered primarily around digitizing and incorporating the large volumes of patient data from electronic health records. AI is now poised to make the next step in health care integration, with precision medicine, imaging support, and development of individual health trends with the popularization of wearable devices. Future clinical pediatric cardiologists will use AI as an adjunct in delivering optimum patient care, with the help of accurate predictive risk calculators, continual health monitoring from wearables, and precision medicine. Physicians must also protect their patients' health information from monetization or exploitation.

A primer on artificial intelligence for the paediatric cardiologist.

The combination of pediatric cardiology being both a perceptual and a cognitive subspecialty demands a complex decision-making model which makes artificial intelligence a particularly attractive technology with great potential. The prototypical artificial intelligence system would autonomously impute patient data into a collaborative database that stores, syncs, interprets and ultimately classifies the patient's profile to specific disease phenotypes to compare against a large aggregate of shared peer health data and outcomes, the current medical body of literature and ongoing trials to offer morbidity and mortality prediction, drug therapy options targeted to each patient's genetic profile, tailored surgical plans and recommendations for timing of sequential imaging. The focus of this review paper is to offer a primer on artificial intelligence and paediatric cardiology by briefly discussing the history of artificial intelligence in medicine, modern and future applications in adult and paediatric cardiology across selected concentrations, and current barriers to implementation of these technologies.

Echocardiographic MRI: an innovative fusion of functional and anatomic assessment strategy for CHD.

We present a pilot case using an innovative fusion of echocardiogram and MRI achieved with a MATLAB-based imaging programme to explore the feasibility of this imaging strategy in the functional and anatomic assessment of a patient with repaired tetralogy of Fallot requiring pulmonary valve intervention. Echocardiogram and MRI neutralises the disadvantages and limitations of each individual imaging modality and yields important anatomic and haemodynamic information crucial to the treatment decision-making process. Future image fusion strategies can apply to three-dimensional images and image-directed therapy for CHD.

Rapidly progressive heart failure requiring transplantation in muscular dystrophy: a need for frequent screening.

Fukuyama congenital muscular dystrophy weakens both skeletal and cardiac muscles, but the rate of cardiomyopathic progression can accelerate faster than that of skeletal muscles. A 14-year-old boy with Fukuyama congenital muscular dystrophy presented with mild skeletal myopathy but severe cardiomyopathy requiring heart transplantation within 1 year of declining heart function. These patients need frequent screening regardless of musculoskeletal symptoms.

Association of Freestanding Children's Hospitals With Outcomes in Children With Critical Illness.

OBJECTIVES: Little is known about the relationship between freestanding children's hospitals and outcomes in children with critical illness. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the association of freestanding children's hospitals with outcomes in children with critical illness. DESIGN: Propensity score matching was performed to adjust for potential confounding variables between patients cared for in freestanding or nonfreestanding children's hospitals. We tested the sensitivity of our findings by repeating the primary analyses using inverse probability of treatment weighting method and regression adjustment using the propensity score. SETTING: Retrospective study from an existing national database, Virtual PICU Systems (LLC) database. PATIENTS: Patients less than 18 years old admitted to one of the participating PICUs in the Virtual PICU Systems, LLC database were included (2009-2014). INTERVENTIONS: None. MEASUREMENTS AND MAIN RESULTS: A total of 538,967 patients from 140 centers were included. Of these, 323,319 patients were treated in 60 freestanding hospitals. In contrast, 215,648 patients were cared for in 80 nonfreestanding hospitals. By propensity matching, 134,656 patients were matched 1:1 in the two groups (67,328 in each group). Prior to matching, patients in the freestanding hospitals were younger, had greater comorbidities, had higher severity of illness scores, had higher incidence of cardiac arrest, had higher resource utilization, and had higher proportion of patients undergoing complex procedures such as cardiac surgery. Before matching, the outcomes including mortality were worse among the patients cared for in the freestanding hospitals (freestanding vs nonfreestanding, 2.5% vs 2.3%; p < 0.001). After matching, the majority of the study outcomes were better in freestanding hospitals (freestanding vs nonfreestanding, mortality: 2.1% vs 2.8%, p < 0.001; standardized mortality ratio: 0.77 [0.73-0.82] vs 0.99 [0.87-0.96], p < 0.001; reintubation: 3.4% vs 3.8%, p < 0.001; good neurologic outcome: 97.7% vs 97.1%, p = 0.001). CONCLUSIONS: In this large observational study, we demonstrated that ICU care provided in freestanding children's hospitals is associated with improved risk-adjusted survival chances compared to nonfreestanding children's hospitals. However, the clinical significance of this change in mortality should be interpreted with caution. It is also possible that the hospital structure may be a surrogate of other factors that may bias the results.

Birth Tourism and Neonatal Intensive Care: A Children's Hospital Experience.

Objective The aim of this article is to examine characteristics of birth tourism (BT) neonates admitted to a neonatal intensive care unit (NICU). Methods This was a retrospective review over 3 years; BT cases were identified, and relevant perinatal, medical, social, and financial data were collected and compared with 100 randomly selected non-birth tourism neonates. Results A total of 46 BT neonates were identified. They were more likely to be born to older women (34 vs. 29 years; p < 0.001), via cesarean delivery (72 vs. 48%; p = 0.007), and at a referral facility (80 vs. 32%; p < 0.001). BT group had longer hospital stay (15 vs. 7 days; p = 0.02), more surgical intervention (50 vs. 21%; p < 0.001), and higher hospital charges (median $287,501 vs. $103,105; p = 0.003). One-third of BT neonates were enrolled in public health insurance program and four BT neonates (10%) were placed for adoption. Conclusion Families of BT neonates admitted to the NICU face significant challenges. Larger studies are needed to better define impacts on families, health care system, and society.

Report of the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute Working Group: An Integrated Network for Congenital Heart Disease Research.

The National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute convened a working group in January 2015 to explore issues related to an integrated data network for congenital heart disease research. The overall goal was to develop a common vision for how the rapidly increasing volumes of data captured across numerous sources can be managed, integrated, and analyzed to improve care and outcomes. This report summarizes the current landscape of congenital heart disease data, data integration methodologies used across other fields, key considerations for data integration models in congenital heart disease, and the short- and long-term vision and recommendations made by the working group.

Innovation in Pediatric Cardiac Intensive Care: An Exponential Convergence Toward Transformation of Care.

The word innovation is derived from the Latin noun innovatus, meaning renewal or change. Although companies such as Google and Apple are nearly synonymous with innovation, virtually all sectors in our current lives are imbued with yearn for innovation. This has led to organizational focus on innovative strategies as well as recruitment of chief innovation officers and teams in a myriad of organizations. At times, however, the word innovation seems like an overused cliché, as there are now more than 5,000 books in print with the word "innovation" in the title. More recently, innovation has garnered significant attention in health care. The future of health care is expected to innovate on a large scale in order to deliver sustained value for an overall transformative care. To date, there are no published reports on the state of the art in innovation in pediatric health care and in particular, pediatric cardiac intensive care. This report will address the issue of innovation in pediatric medicine with relevance to cardiac intensive care and delineate possible future directions and strategies in pediatric cardiac intensive care.

Prevention of metabolic decompensation in an infant with mutase deficient methylmalonic aciduria undergoing cardiopulmonary bypass.

BACKGROUND: Effects of circulatory arrest upon an inborn error of metabolism patient are unknown. METHODS: A retrospective chart review was performed of outcome and biochemical parameters obtained during palliative cardiac surgery for a mutase-deficient methylmalonic aciduria patient with Ebstein's cardiac anomaly was performed. RESULTS: The levels of ammonia, methylmalonic acid, free carnitine, and propionylcarnitine of the patient were improved. The patient survived surgery following institution of four metabolic treatment principles: 1) restriction of toxic substrate; 2) promotion of anabolism via administration of carbohydrate and lipid calories; 3) administration of detoxifying levocarnitine and sodium benzoate; and 4) cobalamin enzymatic co-factor administration. The patient died from post-operative dysrhythmia and was posthumously determined to have compound heterozygosity for mutations predicting severe, cobalamin non-responsive disease: c.322C>T/c.1233del3 (p.R108C/p.ΔI412). CONCLUSION: Metabolic decompensation is preventable during cardiopulmonary bypass and cardioplegia using four principles of metabolic treatment.