Working Group on Extracorporeal Life Support, National Center for Cardiovascular Quality Improvement developed guidelines on patient blood management for adult cardiovascular surgery under cardiopulmonary bypass, aiming to standardize patient blood management in adult cardiovascular surgery under cardiopulmonary bypass, reduce blood resource consumption, and improve patients outcomes. Forty-eight domestic experts participated in the development of the guidelines. Based on prior investigation and the PICO (patient, intervention, control, outcome) principles, thirteen clinical questions from four aspects were selected, including priming and fluid management during cardiopulmonary bypass, anticoagulation and monitoring during cardiopulmonary bypass, peri-cardiopulmonary bypass blood product infusion, and autologous blood infusion. Systemic reviews to the thirteen questions were performed through literature search. Recommendations were drafted using the GRADE (Grading of Recommendations Assessment, Development and Evaluation) system. After five rounds of experts discussions between 2023 and 2024, 19 recommendations were finally formed.
Objective To analyze the characteristics of pathogens causing bloodstream infection (BSI) after cardiovascular surgery, and provide instructions for prevention and treatment of such kind of disease. Methods A retrospective investigation of clinical and pathogenic data of the patients suffering from BSI after cardiovascular surgery in West China Hospital of Sichuan University from January 2015 to December 2016 was performed. There were 61 patients with 36 males and 25 females at average age of 48.2±17.1 years. A percentage of 65.6% (40/61) of the underlying diseases was rheumatic heart disease. Results Sixty-five strains were isolated from the blood culture specimens of the 61 patients. Gram-positive bacteria, gram-negative bacteria and fungi isolates accounted for 56.9% (37/65), 35.4% (23/65), and 7.7% (5/65), respectively. Among these isolates, Streptococcus spp. was predominant (19/65, 29.2%), followed by Staphylococcus epidermidis (8/65, 12.3%), Staphylococcus aureus (6/65, 9.2%), Acinetobacter calcoaceticus- A. baumannii (5/65, 7.7%) and Escherichia coli (5/65, 7.7%). The resistance rate of Streptococcus spp. to erythromycin and clindamycin was 73.4% (14/19) and 63.2% (12/19), while its resistance to cefepime, vancomycin or linezolid was not observed. Staphylococcus spp. showed the resistance rate of 71.4% (10/14) to oxacillin. All of A. calcoaceticus-A. baumannii isolates were multidrug resistant (5/5, 100.0%), and 80.0% (4/5) of them were resistant to imipenem. The isolates producing extended spectrum beta-lactamase accounted for 80.0% (4/5) of E. coli. Conclusion Streptococcus spp. was the common pathogen causing BSI after cardiovascular surgery. Staphylococcus spp. and gram-negative bacilli show high resistance.
In the late-breaking trials session of the American Heart Association’s Scientific Sessions 2021, which took place in November 2021, six clinical trials in cardiac surgery published their primary results. This review will look into three of them including the management of patients with moderate or less-than-moderate tricuspid regurgitation at the time of surgery for degenerative mitral regurgitation, timing of ticagrelor cessation before coronary artery bypass grafting, and long-term outcomes of ticagrelor-based antiplatelet therapy for secondary prevention of coronary artery bypass grafting.
Facing the increasing cardiovascular disease burden and prevailing population risk factors, the cardiovascular surgery in China was also encountering challenges including imbalances in discipline development, significant divergencies in healthcare quality, lacking of clinical guidelines and domestic critical evidence. The concept of quality control and improvement has been practiced and tested in many disease specialties. Quality improvement programs are urgently needed in China to promote the universal cardiovascular surgery healthcare quality.
The cardiovascular surgery in China has reached a stable platform, with notable progress been achieved in the past several decades. However, significant divergency regarding the healthcare quality was also observed, which requiring effective intervention to start the transition from the focus on "quantity" to the pursuit of "quality". Quality improvement program, including the establishment of a national cardiovascular surgery database, the conformation of a standard key quality evaluation indicator system, and the conduction of quality intervention and improvement initiatives, are promising to consolidate and expand the advantages of cardiac surgery and lead to better patient outcomes.
Committee of Minimally Invasive Cardiovascular Surgery (CMICS) annually investigates the minimally invasive cardiovascular surgery performed by departments of cardiovascular surgery of all hospitals in China of last year, and makes classification and summary according to the operation amount of minimally invasive surgery, regional and hospital distribution, and publishes it on the theme report of China Minimally Invasive Cardiovascular Surgery Conference (CMC). In 2021, CMICS published the 2018-2019 annual data of Chinese cardiovascular surgery in the form of a white paper for the first time in the Chinese Journal of Clinical Thoracic and Cardiovascular Surgery, which attracted great attention from peers. In this statistical report, CMICS will focus on the volume of minimally invasive cardiovascular surgery, regional and hospital distribution in China (excluding Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, Macao Special Administrative Region, and Taiwan Province) in the 2020—2021 for your reference.