Central Venous Pressure Estimation by Ultrasound Measurement of Inferior Vena Cava and Aorta Diameters in Pediatric Critical Patients: An Observational Study.

Objectives: To evaluate the ability to predict central venous pressure by ultrasound measured inferior vena cava and aortic diameters in a PICU population and to assess interoperator concordance.

Design: Noninterventional observational study.

Setting: PICU of a tertiary-care academic center.

Coronavirus Disease 2019 in Critically Ill Children: A Narrative Review of the Literature.

Coronavirus disease 2019 has spread around the world. In the 3 months since its emergence, we have learned a great deal about its clinical management and its relevance to the pediatric critical care provider. In this article, we review the available literature and provide valuable insight into the clinical management of this disease, as well as information on preparedness activities that every PICU should perform.

Cardiac arrest in a toddler treated with propranolol for infantile Hemangioma: a case report.

Background: Propranolol has become the first-line treatment for complicated Infantile Hemangioma (IH), showing so far a good risk-benefit profile.

Case Presentation: We report the case of a toddler, on propranolol, who suffered cardiac arrest during an acute viral infection. She had a neurally-mediated syncope that progressed to asystole, probably because of concurrent factors as dehydration, beta-blocking and probably individual susceptibility to vaso-vagal phenomena.

The use of levosimendan in children with cancer with severe acute cardiac dysfunction: case series and a review of the literature.

We report the use of levosimendan in two febrile, neutropenic children with cancer - one post bone marrow transplant - with acute heart failure following chemotherapy. Initial management with epinephrine, milrinone, and diuresis was unsuccessful. Infusion of levosimendan without a loading dose was added to the ongoing heart failure therapy, which resulted in persistent symptomatic and echocardiographic improvement without major side effects.

Effects of aerobic exercise training in children after the Fontan operation.

It was demonstrated that patients who have undergone the Fontan operation can safely undertake exercise training and that this results in an improvement in aerobic capacity. These findings suggest that aerobic training could be useful in the long-term management of these patients to optimize their cardiovascular fitness for more active lives.