Coronary Perfusion Pressure during Antegrade Cardioplegia in On-Pump CABG Patients

OBJECTIVE: The aim of this study was to investigate whether aortic tension estimated by palpation and cardioplegia infusion line pressure provide results equivalent to those obtained with direct aortic intraluminal pressure measurement. METHODS: Sixty consecutive patients who underwent coronary artery bypass graft surgeries with extracorporeal circulation were analyzed. Sanguineous cardioplegic solution in a ratio of 4:1 was administered using a triple lumen antegrade cannula. After crossclamping, cardioplegia was infused and aortic root pressure was recorded by surgeon (A) considering the aortic tension he felt in his fingertips. At the same time, another surgeon (B) recorded his results for the same measurement. Concomitantly, the anesthesiologist recorded intraluminal pressure in the aortic root and the perfusionist recorded delta pressure in cardioplegia infusion line. None of the participants involved in these measurements was allowed to be informed about the values provided by the other examiners. RESULTS: The Bland-Altman test showed that a considerable variation between aortic wall tension was found as measured by palpation and by intraluminal pressure, with a bias of -9.911±18.75% (95% limits of agreement: -46.7 to 26.9). No strong correlation was observed between intraluminal pressure and cardioplegia line pressure (Spearman's r=0.61, 95% confidence interval 0.5-0.7; P<0.0001). CONCLUSION: These findings reinforce that cardioplegia infusion should be controlled by measuring intraluminal pressure, and that palpation and cardioplegia line pressure are inaccurate methods, the latter should always be used to complement intraluminal measurement to ensure greater safety in handling the cardioplegia circuit.