Tehran University Medical Journal

Background: Congenital heart diseases are the second group of congenital anomalies in infants. These disorders are a major cause of death in the first year of a child's life. Early detection helps to treat these diseases better. In this study cardiology consultations of hospitalized infants in the neonatal intensive care unit were evaluated.
Methods: In this cross-sectional study, two hundred and fifty pediatric cardiology consultations conducted in Shahid Beheshti Hospital in the year 2012 were reviewed. Information such as the cause of consulting, delivery type, age of parents, relative couples, family history of congenital heart disease, maternal medications, maternal background diseases, the final diagnosis, and prognosis follow-up of the patients were recorded in a designed questionnaire. Finally, the data were entered into the SPSS software, version 16 (IBM SPSS, Armonk, NY, USA) and analyzed using descriptive statistics and chi-square test. P-value of less than 0.05 was considered significant.
Results: The mean age of the consulted neonates was 4.845±5.14 days with a gestational age of 33.933±3.65 weeks. Male sex and cesarean section were the most frequent. Fifty-six percent of consulted infants were male. The present study revealed that prematurity (76%), murmurs (30.8%), respiratory distress syndrome (14.4%) and cyanosis (13.2%) were the most common causes of the cardiac consultation seeking among infants. Seventy-six percent of infants were consulted due to prematurity. Eighty-four percent of infants had a normal conditions. Septal defects (ventricular or atrial septal defect) and patent ductus arteriosus were the most common disease diagnosed with the prevalence of 27.5 and 17.5%, respectively. There was a significant relationship between preterm labor and congenital heart disease (P<0.001). Additionally, prematurity associated with respiratory distress syndrome and using assisted reproductive techniques.
Conclusion: The higher prevalence of congenital heart disease in the present study, compared with other studies, reflects the fact that cardiology consultation based on clinical suspicion leads to the more identification of congenital heart disease that means the right referral of newborns for consultation was accompanied with a higher incidence of heart failure.

Background: smoking enhances the risk of cardiac events in patients with coronary artery disease. So, it is necessary to evaluate the effects of exercise-based cardiac rehabilitation on endothelial function and functional capacity among smoker patients.
Methods: This randomized clinical trial study was conducted on 56 non-diabetic smokers with a history of percutaneous coronary intervention or coronary artery bypass graft surgery in Imam Khomeini Hospital from May to August 2015. Based on cardiac rehabilitation, patients were divided into intervention and control groups. Before rehabilitation, fasting blood sugar (FBS), lipid profile (LDL, HDL, triglyceride, and total cholesterol), and Ankle-Brachial Index (ABI) were measured for endothelial function. Besides, METs were measured based on the Duke activity status index. After 24 rehabilitation sessions (3 sessions of 1 hour each week for 2 months), all values were checked again and compared with the initial values.

Results: The mean age of the subjects in the cardiac rehabilitation and control groups were 61.18 and 52.32, respectively. Before the intervention, there were no significant differences between the two groups in terms of the ABI variables, BMI, systolic and diastolic blood pressure, LDL, triglyceride, total cholesterol and FBS; only HDL and  METs showed significant differences. After exercise-based cardiac rehabilitation, the mean rate of ABI changes was +0.078 on the right side of the body and +0.084 on the left side of the body. In the control group, these values were 0.002 and 0.003, respectively (P=0.001). The amount of changes in increasing METs as well as decreasing body mass index (BMI), and systolic and diastolic blood pressure in the rehabilitation group were statistically significant compared to the control group. In addition, there were no significant differences in terms of FBS and lipid profiles either (P>0.05). Conclusion: Two months of cardiac rehabilitation with regular exercise was associated with improved ABI as an indicator of endothelial function and prognosis of cardiovascular disease, as well as improved cardiac functional capacity among smoker patients.

Background: Coronary angiography is an elective method to confirm or rule out coronary artery disease and to decide on the treatment plan but it is an invasive method and it has some complications. The most important and common complication was hematoma. It could be the cause of mortality and morbidity. The present study was conducted with the aim of investigating the time of hematoma occurrence after angioplasty and investigating the effect of various factors (for example age, sex, BMI, BP, hematocrit, anticoagulant agent, etc.) on the occurrence of hematoma.
Methods: This was a prospective cohort study from March 2022 to March 2023 in Mazandaran heart center. The study population was patients who underwent angioplasty through the femoral artery. If the ACT is less than 150-180, sheet removal was done by applying pressure with the hand on the proximal puncture site for 15-20 minutes and ensuring sufficient hemostasis. Then, the ultrasound of the puncture site was performed before pulling the sheet/one hour and six hours after pulling the sheet, and after collecting the data, the data were analyzed to study the effect of BMI, BP, sex, hematocrit, hemoglobin, age, time of sheet removal, anticoagulant agent, etc. on prevalence of hematoma and it size.

Results: 200 patients were examined, of which 44(22%) had hematoma. Women had hematoma more than men (P<0.05). BMI and blood pressure in patients with hematoma decreased and increased, respectively (P<0.05). Older age, female gender, lower hematocrit, and longer duration of sheet retention were effective factors in increasing hematoma size (P<0.05). In the logistic regression model, with increasing BMI, the chance of hematoma occurrence decreased (P=0.029, OR=0.831). Conclusion: Controlling blood pressure and preventing of decreasing the hematocrit, reduces the incidence of hematoma in patients after angiography. Also, preventing hematocrit drop and removal of sheet at the appropriate time, can prevent of increasing in size of hematoma. There is some difference between nursing report and sonography finding. Nursing report overestimated the hematoma size.