• Giovanni Chiarini, Silvia Mariani, Anne-Kristin Schaefer, Bas C T van Bussel, Michele Di Mauro, Dominik Wiedemann, Diyar Saeed, Matteo Pozzi, Luca Botta, Udo Boeken, Robertas Samalavicius, Karl Bounader, Xiaotong Hou, BungeJeroen J HJJHDepartment of Intensive Care Adults and Cardiology, Erasmus MC, Rotterdam, The Netherlands., Hergen Buscher, Leonardo Salazar, Bart Meyns, Daniel Herr, Sacha Matteucci, Sandro Sponga, Kollengode Ramanathan, Claudio Russo, Francesco Formica, Pranya Sakiyalak, Antonio Fiore, Daniele Camboni, Giuseppe Maria Raffa, Rodrigo Diaz, I-Wen Wang, Jae-Seung Jung, Jan Belohlavek, Vin Pellegrino, Giacomo Bianchi, Matteo Pettinari, Alessandro Barbone, José P Garcia, Kiran Shekar, WhitmanGlenn J RGJRCardiac Intensive Care Unit, Johns Hopkins Hospital, Baltimore, MD, USA., Roberto Lorusso, and PELS Investigators.
• Cardio-Thoracic Surgery Department, Cardiovascular Research Institute Maastricht, Maastricht University Medical Centre, P. Debyelaan, 25-6202AZ, Maastricht, The Netherlands. giovanni.chiarini88@gmail.com.
• Crit Care. 2024 Aug 7; 28 (1): 265265.

BackgroundCerebral perfusion may change depending on arterial cannulation site and may affect the incidence of neurologic adverse events in post-cardiotomy extracorporeal life support (ECLS). The current study compares patients' neurologic outcomes with three commonly used arterial cannulation strategies (aortic vs. subclavian/axillary vs. femoral artery) to evaluate if each ECLS configuration is associated with different rates of neurologic complications.MethodsThis retrospective, multicenter (34 centers), observational study included adults requiring post-cardiotomy ECLS between January 2000 and December 2020 present in the Post-Cardiotomy Extracorporeal Life Support (PELS) Study database. Patients with Aortic, Subclavian/Axillary and Femoral cannulation were compared on the incidence of a composite neurological end-point (ischemic stroke, cerebral hemorrhage, brain edema). Secondary outcomes were overall in-hospital mortality, neurologic complications as cause of in-hospital death, and post-operative minor neurologic complications (seizures). Association between cannulation and neurological outcomes were investigated through linear mixed-effects models.ResultsThis study included 1897 patients comprising 26.5% Aortic (n = 503), 20.9% Subclavian/Axillary (n = 397) and 52.6% Femoral (n = 997) cannulations. The Subclavian/Axillary group featured a more frequent history of hypertension, smoking, diabetes, previous myocardial infarction, dialysis, peripheral artery disease and previous stroke. Neuro-monitoring was used infrequently in all groups. Major neurologic complications were more frequent in Subclavian/Axillary (Aortic: n = 79, 15.8%; Subclavian/Axillary: n = 78, 19.6%; Femoral: n = 118, 11.9%; p < 0.001) also after mixed-effects model adjustment (OR 1.53 [95% CI 1.02-2.31], p = 0.041). Seizures were more common in Subclavian/Axillary (n = 13, 3.4%) than Aortic (n = 9, 1.8%) and Femoral cannulation (n = 12, 1.3%, p = 0.036). In-hospital mortality was higher after Aortic cannulation (Aortic: n = 344, 68.4%, Subclavian/Axillary: n = 223, 56.2%, Femoral: n = 587, 58.9%, p < 0.001), as shown by Kaplan-Meier curves. Anyhow, neurologic cause of death (Aortic: n = 12, 3.9%, Subclavian/Axillary: n = 14, 6.6%, Femoral: n = 28, 5.0%, p = 0.433) was similar.ConclusionsIn this analysis of the PELS Study, Subclavian/Axillary cannulation was associated with higher rates of major neurologic complications and seizures. In-hospital mortality was higher after Aortic cannulation, despite no significant differences in incidence of neurological cause of death in these patients. These results encourage vigilance for neurologic complications and neuromonitoring use in patients on ECLS, especially with Subclavian/Axillary cannulation.© 2024. The Author(s).

35 keywords...

hide…