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FRIDAY, Oct. 5, 2018 (HealthDay News) — Children with congenital heart disease (CHD) presenting to the emergency department have increased rates of inpatient admission and mortality and higher emergency department charges than those without CHD, according to a study published in the Oct. 9 issue of the Journal of the American College of Cardiology<\/i>.<\/p>\n
Jonathan B. Edelson, M.D., from the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, and colleagues describe national estimates of pediatric CHD-related emergency department visits in an epidemiological analysis of emergency department visit-level data. Data were included for 420,452 CHD-related emergency department visits.<\/p>\n
The CHD emergency department visits accounted for 0.17 percent of all pediatric emergency department visits. The researchers found that those with CHD had an increased likelihood of being younger than 1 year (43 versus 13 percent) and having one or more complex chronic conditions (35 versus 2 percent). The rates of inpatient admission (46 versus 4 percent; adjusted odds ratio, 1.89), median emergency department charges ($1,266 versus $741), and mortality rate (1 versus 0.04 percent; adjusted odds ratio, 1.25) were higher for CHD-related emergency department visits. During the nine-year study period, the adjusted median charges increased from $1,219 to $1,630, while there was a decrease in the mortality rate from 1.13 to 0.75 percent for CHD-related emergency department visits.<\/p>\n
“Children with CHD presenting to the emergency department represent a medically complex population at increased risk for morbidity, mortality, and resource utilization compared with those without CHD,” the authors write.<\/p>\n
Several authors disclosed financial ties to pharmaceutical and medical device companies.<\/p>\n
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