Electroencephalography Findings in Children with Congential Heart Disease

Background: Children with Congenital Heart Disease (CHD) as well as survivors of cardiac surgeries are at risk for brain injury and neurodevelopmental deficits.The Aim of this Work: Is to evaluate the Electroencepha-lography (EEG) findings as an indicator for cerebral function in children with congenital heart disease and to correlate these findings to the oxygen saturation.Patients and Methods: This is a cross-sectional study included 30 patients (17 males and 13 females) with CHD (20 with cyanotic and 10 with acyanotic CHD) with age range 4-9 years. Compared with 30 age and sex matched healthy children as controls. All children underwent; digital EEG recording for detection of background slowing and epileptic changes and measurement of oxygen saturation using pulse oximeter.Results: EEG findings were present in 17 (30%) patients (16 patients with cyanotic and 1 with acyanotic CHD). Detected EEG changes were: Epileptic activity in 6 (20%) patients (all had cyanotic CHD), background activity slowing in 16 (53.3%) patients (1 with acyanotic and 15 with cyanotic CHD), while both epileptic changes & back ground activity slowing were detected in 5 (16.7%) patients (all with cyanotic CHD). The cut off value of O2 saturation below which background activity slowing are liable to occur was 87%, with a sensitivity and specificity of 81.2% and 71.4% respectively.Conclusion: Children with cyanotic CHD had significantly higher EEG changes than those with acyanotic CHD.Recommendation: The digital EEG should be performed routinely in patients with CHD (particularly cyanotic) to detect abnormalities in the cerebral function.