A team at Peoria, Ill.-based OSF HealthCare's Children’s Hospital of Illinois became the first in the world to implant an extravascular implantable, cardioverter-defibrillator in a pediatric patient who had suffered sudden cardiac arrest.
The Medtronic device had previously only been used in adults or older teenagers, according to a Dec. 3 news release from the health system.
Parents of the 2-year-old patient resuscitated the child at home before they were transported to OSF Children’s Hospital of Illinois, where the child was diagnosed with Brugada syndrome, the release said.
Implantation of an EV-ICD is minimally invasive and, once in use, the device shocks the heart back into rhythm when malignant heart arrhythmias occur.
The procedure was led by Sunita Ferns, MD, director of pediatric and adult congenital electrophysiology, and Mark Plunkett, MD, chief of pediatric and congenital heart surgery, and performed by pediatric cardiac surgeon, Harma Turbendian, MD.
"This implantation is the smallest and youngest child ever to have this device," Dr. Plunkett said in the release. "The fact we've proven it to be effective and safely implantable in a child this size really expands its application immensely."