A Review Of 10 Years Autopsy Of Children With Cardiovascular Disorders

SUMMARY

Objectives: To review the prevalence and pattern of cardiovascular disorders in childhood autopsies in Lagos University Teaching Hospital (LUTH). To also determine the frequency of associated extra cardiac complications and characteristics of children with cardiovascular diseases that died.

Materials and Methods: The autopsy register of the department of Morbid anatomy for the years 1991 to 2000 in LUTH was retrospectively reviewed. Data extracted including age, sex, primary diagnosis and cause of death was obtained for children aged less than 18years and analysed using SPSS 11.0 software.

Results: Cardiovascular disorder was found in 93 of 2,032 autopsies (4.6%) done on children in LUTH for the study period. Sixty nine (74.1%) of the cardiovascular disorders were congenital heart diseases while 22 (23.7%) were acquired heart diseases. The commonest acyanotic and cyanotic congenital heart diseases were ventricular septal defect and tetralogy of fallot respectively. Rheumatic heart disease was the predominant acquired heart disease. The peak incidence was in the neonatal period with 31 (33.3%) neonates. There were extra cardiac complications in 23% of cases. These mostly involved the respiratory and central nervous system with bronchopneumonia being the commonest non-cardiac complication. The primary cause of death for 70 (75.3%) of them was cardiac failure.

Conclusion: Majority of children with cardiovascular diseases die in the neonatal period making cardiac diseases one of the contributions to neonatal deaths. Early diagnosis, appropriate medical management and surgical intervention will help prevent these deaths thereby reducing neonatal and child mortality.