Growth Restriction in Infants and Young Children with Congenital Heart Disease.

Objective: The purpose of this study was to determine the prevalence of growth restriction in infants and young children with congenital heart disease (CHD) and investigate the relationship between poor growth, feeding difficulties, cardiac classification, and nutrition intervention on outcomes.

Design: This is a prospective observational cohort study of infants and young children with CHD aged 0-3 years admitted to hospital for cardiac surgery. Anthropometry, growth history, cardiac classification, cardiac diagnosis, feeding difficulty, and nutrition intervention data were collected for 78 participants.

Results: Many participants demonstrated growth restriction as evidenced by a z-score ≤ -2 for population growth parameters including weight/age z-score (n = 18, 23%), height/age z-score (n = 16, 21%), and weight/height z-score (n = 12, 18%). Increased hospital length of stay was associated with factors including faltering growth preadmission (P = .009), tube feeding required preadmission (P = .002), diagnosis of cyanotic CHD (P = .015), and presence of a feeding difficulty (P = .015).

Conclusions: Growth restriction remains an ongoing problem in children with CHD. Faltering growth preadmission and lower growth parameters were associated with an increased hospital length of stay. Nutritional screening from diagnosis may detect growth faltering, improve access to early nutrition intervention, and improve patient outcomes.