Predicting Postoperative Thrombosis after Congenital Heart Surgery

Vanderbilt University Medical Center
Nashville, TN

Principal Investigator:  Prince J. Kannankeril, MD, Professor of Pediatrics, Cardiology

Postoperative thrombosis complicates roughly 10% of congenital heart disease (CHD) surgeries and is associated with increased mortality and hospital length of stay. Despite the widespread availability of effective medications to prevent thrombosis, we currently lack the ability to predict which patients are at sufficient risk for postoperative thrombosis during routine care. Our goal is to improve the lives of patients with CHD by reducing the impact of postoperative thrombosis on mortality, morbidity, and resource utilization.

This project aims to do the following:

1.     To develop a clinical risk-prediction model of postoperative thrombosis after CHD surgery.

2.     To identify genetic predictors of postoperative thrombosis after CHD surgery

3.     To test the hypothesis that adding genetic predictors to the clinical model improves predictive performance