Background: The aim of this study is to determine how Congenital Heart Disease as a whole and its related complication named pulmonary hypertension affect children's growth.
Patients and Methods: This is an analytical case-control study included 100 healthy controls and 106 children with Congenital Heart Disease (40 cyanotic & 66 Acyanotic). Their ages are ranging from 1 month to 10 years. They were selected from the Fayoum University Children's hospital during the period from May 2020 to November 2021 by simple random method. Echocardiographic evaluation was done. On Egyptian Growth Charts, we measured weight, height for children who were able to stand, or length for infants in a supine position along with their percentiles for age to assess growth. Body Mass Index (BMI) was calculated.
Results: The mean±SD weight of cyanotic patients was (8.66±4.1) kg, and Acyanotic patients was (8.63±4.5)kg and the mean±SD heights of both groups were (75.15±14.5) cm,(73.03±76.8) cm, respectively, which were significantly lower than control's mean weight (12.02±11.4) kg , and control's mean height (85.09±16) cm. Acyanotic patients complicated with pulmonary arterial hypertension (29 patients) had statistically significant higher rates of weight retardation and short stature with P- value 0.01 and 0.001 respectively, and by logistic regression analysis they were likely to develop weight retardation and short stature by 6.02 and 3.6 times, respectively, more than children without pulmonary hypertension.
Conclusion: The findings of the study confirmed that Congenital Heart Diseases had a detrimental impact on children's growth especially those complicated with pulmonary hypertension.