Cardiac surgery can be not infrequently complicated by cardiac low-output syndrome due to critical preoperative conditions such as cardiogenic shock, poor left ventricular function and severe myocardial ischemia. Suboptimal myocardial protection, technical errors at graft anastomoses or of prosthesis implantation, and hibernating myocardium may further contribute to cardiac low-output syndrome occurring immediately or shortly after cardiac surgery. In this setting, veno-arterial extracorporeal oxygenation (VA-ECMO) is the only means to provide cardiopulmonary support to recovery or as bridge to transplantation. Data on the real benefit of VA-ECMO after cardiac surgery is limited and often derived from heterogeneous patient populations, which prevent conclusive results on the benefits of VA-ECMO in this setting. This issue will be investigated in the present retrospective European multicenter study. In this setting, veno-arterial extracorporeal oxygenation (VA-ECMO) is the only means to provide cardiopulmonary support to recovery or as bridge to transplantation. Data on the real benefit of VA-ECMO after cardiac surgery is limited and often derived from heterogeneous populations of patients who underwent different cardiac procedures. Patients with cardiac low-output after surgery for aortic dissection or valve surgery are expected to have different baseline characteristics (such as age and comorbidities) and underlying cardiac disease than patients undergoing isolated coronary surgery. Furthermore, available studies included patients operated two decades ago and this does not provide an exact measure of the benefits of this treatment strategy. The possible benefits of using VA-ECMO after adult cardiac surgery will be investigated in this retrospective European multicenter study.
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Hospital death
Timeframe: Up to 30 days after the index cardiac surgery