Impact of Antegrade Pulmonary Blood Flow as Patients Progress Through Single-Ventricle Palliations

The impact of antegrade pulmonary blood flow (APBF) during single-ventricle (SV) palliation continues to be debated. We sought to assess its impact on the hemodynamic profile and the short- and long-term outcomes of patients progressing through stages of SV palliation.

A retrospective single-center study was conducted of SV patients who underwent surgery between January 2010 and December 2020. Patients with APBF were matched to those with no APBF by a propensity score based on body surface area, sex, and type of systemic ventricle. Analysis was performed using appropriate statistics with a significance level of P = .05.

Sixty-three patients with APBF were matched with 95 patients with no APBF. At the pre-stage 2 catheterization, APBF patients had a larger left pulmonary artery diameter (z score, 0.1 vs -0.8; P < .042). Patients with APBF had shorter cardiopulmonary bypass time (57.0 vs 79.0 minutes), shorter duration of mechanical ventilation (14.1 vs 17.4 hours), and shorter hospital length of stay (5.0 vs 7.0 days) at stage 2 palliation (P < .05). In the multivariable Cox regression analysis, patients with hypoplastic pulmonary arteries (z scores < -2; adjusted hazard ratio, 9.17) and patients with chromosomal abnormalities/genetic syndrome (adjusted hazard ratio, 4.03) were at increased risk for poor outcomes (P < .05). During the follow-up period, there was no significant difference in risk of the composite poor outcome and long-term survival between groups.

SV patients with APBF had shorter cardiopulmonary bypass time, duration of mechanical ventilation, and hospital length of stay after stage 2 palliation. Patients with hypoplastic pulmonary arteries or chromosomal abnormalities/genetic syndromes had increased risk for poor outcomes. Maintaining APBF has better short-term outcomes, but there are no long-term hemodynamic or survival benefits.