The Journal of Tehran University Heart Center
Volume:12 Issue: 4, Oct 2017

Mortality and major adverse cardiac events (MACE) frequently occur after percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI). Therefore, the ability to predict such events through an established risk stratification method is of great importance. The present study was aimed at determining the risk stratification of mortality and MACE in post-PCI patients at the intensive cardiac care unit of Cipto Mangunkusumo Hospital (CMH) using 7 variables of the New Mayo Clinic Risk Score (NMCRS).
This cross-sectional study drew upon secondary data gathered from the medical records of 313 patients that underwent PCI at the intensive cardiac care unit (ICCU) of CMH between August 1st, 2013, and August 31st, 2014. The primary end point was all-cause mortality and MACE. Seven variables in the NMCRS, namely age, left ventricular ejection fraction, serum creatinine, preprocedural cardiogenic shock, myocardial infarction, and peripheral arterial disease, were evaluated.
The mortality and MACE incidence rates in the post-PCI patients were 3.8% (95%CI: 2.6-5.0) and 8.3% (95% CI: 6.6-10.0), respectively. Regarding the NMCRS stratification, elderly patients with lower left ventricular ejection fraction, increased serum creatinine, preprocedural cardiogenic shock, myocardial infarction, and peripheral arterial disease had higher mortality and MACE incidence rates among the post-PCI patients. The mortality and MACE incidence rates significantly increased in the post-PCI patients with a higher NMCRS.
Patients with a higher NMCRS had a tendency toward higher mortality and MACE incidence rates following PCI.

The association between coronary angiographic findings and the level of anxiety symptoms among patients who undergo coronary angiography is not known. The aim of this study was to investigate the association between the extent of coronary stenosis and anxiety symptoms in patients who undergo coronary angiography.
In a cross-sectional study, 106 patients who underwent coronary angiography and had varying degrees of coronary artery disease were enrolled. Demographic characteristics (i.e., age and gender), socioeconomic status (i.e., educational attainment, income, and marital status), and traditional risk factors (i.e., hypertension, diabetes mellitus, hyperlipidemia, and smoking) were measured. The independent variable was the extent of coronary stenosis shown by coronary angiography, coded as single-vessel disease (n = 19), 2-vessel disease (n = 28), or 3-vessel disease (n = 59). The main outcome was symptoms of anxiety measured using the Hospital Anxiety Depression Scale (HADS). The Kruskal–Wallis test was used for bivariate analysis, and linear regression was applied for multivariable analysis.
Participants were mostly men (n = 78, 73%), at a mean age of 50.14 ± 10.60 years. We found an inverse association between the extent of coronary stenosis and anxiety symptoms in our samples. Anxiety symptoms were lowest in the patients with 3-vessel disease and highest in those with single-vessel disease. The above association remained significant in a linear regression model, controlled for the demographic, socioeconomic, and traditional risk factors.
An inverse association may exist between the extent of coronary stenosis and the severity of anxiety symptoms in patients who undergo coronary angiography. Patients who undergo angiography and have fewer angiographic findings require screening for anxiety symptoms.

Most of the recent reports on acquired heart diseases (AHDs) among Nigerian children are either retrospective or cover a short period of time with fewer subjects. The last report on AHDs among children in Lagos was about a decade ago; it was, however, not specific to children with AHDs but was part of a report on structural heart diseases among children in Lagos. The present study was carried out to document the prevalence and profile of different AHDs in children and to compare the findings with those previously reported.
We conducted a quantitative, nonexperimental, prospective, and cross-sectional review of all consecutive cases of AHDs diagnosed with echocardiography at the Lagos State University Teaching Hospital between January 2007 and June 2016. Comparisons between the normally distributed quantitative data were made with the Student t test, while the χ2 test was applied for the categorical data.
The subjects with AHDs were 73 males and 52 females, with a male-to-female ratio of 1.4:1. The children were aged 15 days to 14 years, with a mean of 6.61 ± 4.26 years. Rheumatic heart disease was the most common AHD, documented in a quarter of the children, followed by dilated cardiomyopathy and pericardial effusion in 20.8% and 17.3%, respectively. Less common lesions encountered were Kawasaki disease, mitral valve prolapse, hyperdynamic circulation, and supraventricular tachycardia.
Rheumatic heart disease was still the most common AHD in the children in the present study. Dilated cardiomyopathy and pericardial effusion are on the increase as has been reported earlier.

The aortico-left ventricular tunnel is a rare congenital abnormality resulting in a pathologic connection between the aorta and the left ventricle. It often presents during infancy or early childhood as a cardiac failure symptom or an incidental finding of a cardiac murmur due to severe aortic regurgitation. It is, however, also occasionally found in asymptomatic adults. We describe a 20-year-old female presenting with palpitations in whom clinical evaluations with echocardiography and computed tomography angiography led to the diagnosis of severe aortic regurgitation caused by a tunnel connecting the right sinus of the aorta to the left ventricle. The patient underwent successful obstruction of the tunnel with an autologous pericardial patch and the repair of the dilated aortic root via the reduction aortoplasty technique. She was discharged on the 5th postoperative day with no complications. At 1 month’s follow-up, she remained asymptomatic and echocardiography showed aortic valve competence with no residual regurgitation.

Thromboembolism occurs commonly in general practice and leads to significant health burden. Apart from cardiac sources, aortic atherosclerotic plaques contribute considerably to thromboembolism. A 63-year-old diabetic hypertensive woman referred to our center due to exertional chest pain unresponsive to optimal medical therapy and underwent coronary angiography. Owing to resistance during guide-wire advancement, an aortography was performed. Aortic arch injection demonstrated a large suspended mass distal to the left subclavian artery with free movement in the descending thoracic aorta. Echocardiography revealed widespread atherosclerotic changes in the aortic arch with a large hypermobile mass. Dual-source multi-slice (2 × 128:256) computed tomography angiography of the whole aorta revealed a large floating mass (in favor of a thrombus) in the distal portion of the arch. The patient underwent coronary artery bypass grafting due to severe coronary artery disease. The intra-aortic mass, which was actually a large atherosclerotic plaque, was resected at the same session. She was discharged uneventfully and during a 1-year follow-up, she had no embolic events.

Malignant hyperthermia (MH) can develop after contact with volatile anesthetics (halothane, enflurane, isoflurane, sevoflurane, and desflurane) as well as succinylcholine and cause hypermetabolism during anesthesia, which is associated with high mortality when untreated. Early diagnosis and treatment could be life-saving. During cardiac surgery, hypothermia and cardiopulmonary bypass make the diagnosis of MH extremely challenging compared with other settings such as general surgery.
We herein report 2 cases of MH, graded as “very likely” or “almost certain” based on the MH clinical grading scale. A 14-month-old infant and a 53-year-old male underwent surgery for severe pulmonary valve stenosis and mitral valve replacement, respectively. Both of them were extubated on the operation day, but they deteriorated with the development of high-grade fever, hypotension, renal failure, and acidosis. The first case had muscle spasms. Unfortunately, the delayed symptoms of MH in the early postoperative course were not diagnosed in these 2 cases, which caused permanent neurologic damage in the first case and death in the second one. However, the infant was discharged from the hospital after 2 months.

The Noonan syndrome is a rare disorder, one of whose major complications is cardiovascular involvement. A wide spectrum of congenital heart diseases has been observed in this syndrome. The most common cardiac disorder is pulmonary valve stenosis, which has a progressive nature. Hypertrophic cardiomyopathy is less common, but its morbidity and mortality rates are high. We herein introduce a 12-year-old boy with the typical findings of the Noonan syndrome. His symptoms began from infancy, and there was a gradual exacerbation in his respiratory and cardiac manifestations with age. The cardiac involvement included right ventricular outflow tract and pulmonary valve stenosis, hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, and subaortic valve stenosis. Due to the progressive course of the disease, surgical repair was done. Although the patient had a difficult postoperative period, his general condition improved and he was discharged. At 3 months’ follow-up, his symptoms showed improvement. Additionally, there was a reduction in the echocardiographic parameters of the outflow tract stenosis gradient as well as a significant improvement in the cardiac hemodynamic indices.

Superior vena cava (SVC) syndrome is a medical condition resulting from the obstruction of the blood flow through the large central veins. Recently, central venous catheters have been reported as the increasingly common cause of this syndrome. We describe a 56-year-old woman with previous history of metastatic colon cancer, who had recently undergone central venous catheter insertion for her second chemotherapy course. Eight days following port insertion, she presented with signs and symptoms suggestive of acute SVC syndrome, which was successfully managed with catheter-directed thrombolysis. The pre-discharge transesophageal echocardiography and conventional angiography showed a patent SVC. The patient was discharged and remained asymptomatic over a 6-month follow-up. This case shows that catheter-directed thrombolysis may be used as a safe treatment for catheter-induced acute SVC syndrome in patients who have undergone catheter insertion in the central vein.