Low Risk of Variceal Bleeding Among Subjects With Cirrhosis Treated With Electroconvulsive Therapy: A Nationwide Study

Esophageal variceal bleeding is a dangerous complication of end-stage liver disease. There is limited information evaluating the hypothesis that medical procedures, specifically electroconvulsive therapy (ECT), may lead to variceal bleeding. The current study aims to determine the risk of variceal bleeding among subjects with cirrhosis who undergo ECT compared with other short medical procedures.

The Nationwide Inpatient Sample (2002-2013) and Nationwide Readmissions Database (2010-2014) were queried using International Classification of Disease, Ninth Revision, codes to evaluate all patients 18 years or older with cirrhosis who underwent ECT, bronchoscopy, or cystoscopy, or who experienced in-hospital seizures. Rates of variceal bleeding and hospital outcomes were compared. Multivariable analysis for readmission rate was performed.

From the Nationwide Inpatient Sample, a total of 5,442,306 patients with cirrhosis were studied, including 840 (0.02%) patients who underwent ECT. Patients who underwent ECT were more likely to have compensated cirrhosis (P < 0.001). Among patients without ECT, 6.8% had variceal bleeding during admission compared with 0% who underwent ECT. From the Nationwide Readmissions Database, 1,383,853 patients were included, including 357 patients (0.03%) who underwent ECT during index admission. Electroconvulsive therapy did not increase the risk of 30- or 90-day readmission for variceal bleeding or mortality compared with other short medical procedures.

Electroconvulsive therapy does not increase the risk of variceal bleeding in subjects with compensated and decompensated cirrhosis. Preoperative optimization of these patients should take the risk of bleeding into account based on current guidelines for variceal surveillance.