Interventionism in congenital heart disease in Chiapas. The history after thousand cases performed

Roberto Mijangos-Vázquez, Departamento de Cardiología Intervencionista Pediátrica, Hospital de Especialidades Pediátricas, Universidad Autónoma de Chiapas, Tuxtla Gutiérrez, Chiapas, México
Rogelio Hernández-Reyes, Departamento de Cardiología Intervencionista Pediátrica, Hospital de Especialidades Pediátricas, Universidad Autónoma de Chiapas, Tuxtla Gutiérrez, Chiapas, México

Background: Congenital heart disease is the most common birth defect and the leading cause of childhood mortality in high-income countries. In these countries, the prognosis for a child born with congenital heart disease is excellent, with over 90% achieving adulthood. However, in the low and lower-middle-income countries, as ours, the outlook is starkly different. In Chiapas, because of the progress of the hemodynamics program, more and more types of congenital heart diseases are susceptible to being treated by cardiac catheterization. Objective: To show the global experience of the interventionism in congenital heart diseases in Chiapas from its inception to recent days. Method: Through a retrospective study from April 2016 to June 2023, we reviewed the electronic files of the total of patients who underwent cardiac catheterism during the same period of time. Results: A total of 1000 procedures were performed, 581 in female patients, with a median age of 4 years (1 day to 77 years). Of the total procedures, 115 (11.5%) were diagnostic catheterizations and 885 (88.5%) were interventional. Conclusions: Cardiac catheterization in pediatrics in Chiapas has displaced cardiac surgery in a large percentage, and the results that have been obtained are undoubtedly encouraging, which already represents a decentralization in the care of congenital heart diseases in our country.

Keywords: Diagnostic catheterization. Interventional catheterization. Congenital heart disease. Chiapas.