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. 2025 Mar 15.
doi: 10.1038/s41372-025-02257-6. Online ahead of print.

Management of the patent ductus arteriosus among infants born at 23 to 32 weeks' gestation between 2011 to 2022: a report from in the Children's Hospitals Neonatal Consortium

Mark F Weems  1 , Molly K Ball  2 , Isabella Zaniletti  3 , Sharifa Habib  4 , Shannon Hamrick  5 , Theresa R Grover  3   6 , Sarah Keene  5 , Karna Murthy  3   7 , Michael Padula  3   8 , Ranjit Philip  9 , Rakesh Rao  10 , Shawn Sen  11 , Philip T Levy  12 , Sharada H Gowda  13 ; CHNC Cardiac Focus Group
Affiliations

Management of the patent ductus arteriosus among infants born at 23 to 32 weeks' gestation between 2011 to 2022: a report from in the Children's Hospitals Neonatal Consortium

Mark F Weems et al. J Perinatol. .

Abstract

Objective: This study reports on patent ductus arteriosus (PDA) therapy trends across the Children's Hospital Neonatal Consortium.

Study design: We performed a 12-year (2011-2022) retrospective study of premature infants (< 33 weeks) with a PDA. We utilized descriptive statistics to compare demographic, inpatient, and discharge characteristics in 3-year epochs.

Result: From 54,813 infants, 19,843 (36%) had a diagnosis of PDA. Use of pharmacotherapy increased 44% (relative) over time, mostly with increased acetaminophen use. There was a 12.7-fold increase in exposure to multiple PDA medications over the study period. While the rate of definitive closure did not change, use of transcatheter PDA closure increased from 0 to 20.3% and surgical ligation decreased from 25.1% to 3.6%.

Conclusion: There has been an increase in the use of multiple pharmacotherapies for PDA, especially among infants born <27 weeks' gestation. Transcatheter PDA closure has overtaken surgical ligation as the primary method of definitive PDA closure.

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Conflict of interest statement

Competing interests: MFW is a consultant and speaker for Abbott Congenital Heart for the Piccolo™ PDA Occluder and an associate editor for Pediatrics in Review. RP is a consultant and speaker for Abbott Congenital Heart for the Piccolo™ PDA Occluder. PTL is a speaker for Abbott Congenital Heart for the Piccolo™ PDA Occluder. TRG, KM, and MP are executive members of the Children’s Hospitals Neonatal Consortium, Inc. SHG is on the editorial board of NeoReviews Plus. MKB, IZ, SH, SH, SK, RR, and SS have no competing interests to report. Ethics approval and consent to particiapte: The Stanley Manne Children’s Research Institute’s Institutional Review Board (Chicago, IL) approved de-identified data analysis (identifier: 2011–14673), and each center obtained local regulatory oversight to participate in the CHNC. This study was performed in accordance with the Declaration of Helsinki.

References

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