Cardiothoracic surgery in Papua New Guinea (PNG) was somewhat ad hoc prior to 1956 but later settled into an arrangement in which visiting teams from overseas selected mostly adult patients for a limited range of closed heart operations to be done locally or overseas. In 1978 the late Professor John Biddulph was instrumental in facilitating a more formal arrangement with the Royal Prince Alfred Hospital whereby patients were selected by a visiting cardiologist on an annual basis to be transferred to Sydney for cardiac surgery. This subsequently developed into a predominantly paediatric program based at the Royal Alexandra Hospital for Children in Sydney, which successfully ran until 1992. In 1993 a program began, based at the Sydney Adventist Hospital, in which a voluntary cardiac team has been visiting annually to perform both open and closed heart surgery. This program has proved to be very successful with a high output and a low mortality. Despite this long history of surgery for congenital heart disease in PNG, no definite long-term plans have eventuated. Because the financial situation of the country does not allow for a major cardiothoracic unit, the current arrangement whereby noninvasive investigation and some closed surgery are performed at Port Moresby General Hospital is appropriate for the foreseeable future.
Australia ; Cardiac Surgical Procedures - economics ; Cardiac Surgical Procedures - statistics & ; numerical ; Child Heart Defects, Congenital - surgery ; Humans ; Medical Missions ; Papua New Guinea

BACKGROUNDSeveral risk stratification models have been developed for cardiac surgery. This study aimed to evaluate the accuracy of four existing risk stratification models, the Fuwai System for Cardiac Operative Risk Evaluation (FuwaiSCORE), the Society of Thoracic Surgeons 2008 cardiac surgery risk model for isolated valve surgery (the STS model), the European System for Cardiac Operative Risk Evaluation (EuroSCORE) and the initial Parsonnet's score (the Parsonnet model) in predicting prolonged intensive care unit (ICU) stay in Chinese patients undergoing heart valve surgery.

METHODSData were collected retrospectively from records of 1333 consecutive patients who received heart valve surgery in a single center between November 2006 and December 2007. Prolonged ICU stay was defined as not less than 124 hours. Calibration was assessed using the Hosmer-Lemeshow (H-L) goodness of fit test. Discrimination was assessed using the receiver-operating-characteristic (ROC) curve area.

RESULTSThe FuwaiSCORE showed good calibration and discrimination compared with other risk models. According to the H-L statistics, the value of the FuwaiSCORE was 12.82, P > 0.1. The area under ROC curve of the FuwaiSCORE was 0.81 (95%CI 0.78 - 0.84).

CONCLUSIONSOur study suggests that the FuwaiSCORE is superior to the other three risk models in predicting prolonged length of ICU stay in Chinese patients with heart valve surgery. Having fewer variables, the system is much easier for bedside use than other systems.

Adult ; Cardiac Surgical Procedures ; statistics & numerical data ; China ; Female ; Heart Valves ; surgery ; Humans ; Male ; Middle Aged ; Models, Theoretical ; Risk Assessment

BACKGROUNDAfter cardiac surgery, central venous oxygen saturation (ScvO 2 ) and serum lactate concentration are often used to guide resuscitation; however, neither are completely reliable indicators of global tissue hypoxia. This observational study aimed to establish whether the ratio between the veno-arterial carbon dioxide and the arterial-venous oxygen differences (P(v-a)CO 2 /C(a-v)O 2 ) could predict whether patients would respond to resuscitation by increasing oxygen delivery (DO 2 ).

METHODSWe selected 72 patients from a cohort of 290 who had undergone cardiac surgery in our institution between January 2012 and August 2014. The selected patients were managed postoperatively on the Intensive Care Unit, had a normal ScvO 2 , elevated serum lactate concentration, and responded to resuscitation by increasing DO 2 by >10%. As a consequence, 48 patients responded with an increase in oxygen consumption (VO 2 ) while VO 2 was static or fell in 24.

RESULTSAt baseline and before resuscitative intervention in postoperative cardiac surgery patients, a P(v-a)CO 2 /C(a-v)O 2 ratio ≥1.6 mmHg/ml predicted a positive VO 2 response to an increase in DO 2 of >10% with a sensitivity of 68.8% and a specificity of 87.5%.

CONCLUSIONSP(v-a)CO 2 /C(a-v)O 2 ratio appears to be a reliable marker of global anaerobic metabolism and predicts response to DO 2 challenge. Thus, patients likely to benefit from resuscitation can be identified promptly, the P(v-a)CO 2 /C(a-v)O 2 ratio may, therefore, be a useful resuscitation target.

Adult ; Aged ; Blood Gas Analysis ; Carbon Dioxide ; blood ; Cardiac Surgical Procedures ; Female ; Humans ; Hyperlactatemia ; blood ; therapy ; Intensive Care Units ; statistics & numerical data ; Lactic Acid ; blood ; Male ; Middle Aged ; Oxygen Consumption ; physiology ; Prospective Studies ; Resuscitation

Adolescent ; Adult ; Cardiac Catheterization ; economics ; methods ; Cardiac Surgical Procedures ; economics ; methods ; Cardiac Valve Annuloplasty ; Child ; China ; epidemiology ; Echocardiography ; Female ; Heart Septal Defects, Ventricular ; complications ; diagnostic imaging ; surgery ; Humans ; Length of Stay ; statistics & numerical data ; Male ; Operative Time ; Postoperative Complications ; epidemiology ; Septal Occluder Device ; Tricuspid Valve Insufficiency ; complications ; diagnostic imaging ; surgery ; Young Adult

PURPOSE: We compared the efficacy of postoperative hemodynamic goal-directed therapy (GDT) using a pulmonary artery catheter (PAC) and bioreactance-based noninvasive cardiac output monitoring (NICOM) in patients with atrial fibrillation undergoing valvular heart surgery. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Fifty eight patients were randomized into two groups of GDT with common goals to maintain a mean arterial pressure of 60-80 mm Hg and cardiac index > or =2 L/min/m2: the PAC group (n=29), based on pulmonary capillary wedge pressure, and the NICOM group (n=29), based on changes in stroke volume index after passive leg raising. The primary efficacy variable was length of hospital stay. Secondary efficacy variables included resource utilization including vasopressor and inotropic requirement, fluid balance, and major morbidity endpoints. RESULTS: Patient characteristics and operative data were similar between the groups, except that significantly more patients underwent double valve replacement in the NICOM group. The lengths of hospital stay were not different between the two groups (12.2+/-4.8 days vs. 10.8+/-4.0 days, p=0.239). Numbers of patients requiring epinephrine (5 vs. 0, p=0.019) and ventilator care >24 h (6 vs. 1, p=0.044) were significantly higher in the PAC group. The PAC group also required significantly larger amounts of colloid (1652+/-519 mL vs. 11430+/-463 mL, p=0.004). CONCLUSION: NICOM-based postoperative hemodynamic GDT showed promising results in patients with atrial fibrillation undergoing valvular heart surgery in terms of resource utilization.
Aged ; Aged, 80 and over ; Cardiac Output/*physiology ; Cardiac Surgical Procedures/*methods ; Catheterization, Swan-Ganz ; Female ; Goals ; Heart Valves/*surgery ; Hemodynamics ; Humans ; Length of Stay/*statistics & numerical data ; Male ; Middle Aged ; Monitoring, Intraoperative/methods ; Monitoring, Physiologic/methods ; Postoperative Complications/epidemiology/prevention & control ; Postoperative Period