Research Article: A novel nomogram for predicting early postoperative cerebral desaturation events after congenital heart surgery
Abstract:
Infants undergoing congenital heart surgery with cardiopulmonary bypass (CPB) are at high risk for perioperative neurological injury, and early postoperative cerebral desaturation events (CDEs) remain common. Reliable tools for individualized risk stratification are lacking. This study aims to develop and internally validate a nomogram for predicting early postoperative CDEs in infants undergoing congenital heart surgery with CPB.
This retrospective cohort study included 397 infants aged >1 month and ?1 year who underwent elective congenital heart surgery with CPB. Patients were randomly divided into a development cohort ( n =?277) and a validation cohort ( n =?120). Early postoperative CDEs were assessed using near-infrared spectroscopy monitoring at cardiac intensive care unit admission. Prespecified perioperative variables measured before or during CPB were entered into a multivariable logistic regression model to construct a nomogram. Model performance was evaluated using discrimination, calibration, and decision curve analysis, with internal validation.
Early postoperative CDEs occurred in 16.88% of the overall cohort, with comparable incidences in the development (18.1%) and validation (14.2%) cohorts. The final model included body surface area, RACHS-1 category, CPB duration, hematocrit during CPB, and CPB temperature strategy. The nomogram demonstrated good discrimination in the development cohort [C-statistic 0.798, 95% confidence interval (CI) 0.729–0.857] and the validation cohort (0.767, 95% CI 0.629–0.886), with satisfactory calibration. The decision curve analysis suggested potential clinical usefulness across clinically relevant threshold probabilities.
An internally validated, infant-specific nomogram based on routinely available perioperative variables was developed to predict early postoperative cerebral desaturation following congenital heart surgery with CPB. External validation is required before clinical implementation.
Introduction:
Infants undergoing congenital heart surgery with cardiopulmonary bypass (CPB) are at high risk for perioperative neurological injury, and early postoperative cerebral desaturation events (CDEs) remain common. Reliable tools for individualized risk stratification are lacking. This study aims to develop and internally validate a nomogram for predicting early postoperative CDEs in infants undergoing congenital heart surgery with CPB.
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