Heart rate control with landiolol hydrochloride in infants with ventricular dysfunction and pulmonary hypertension

AIMS: Sinus tachycardia potentially leads to a deterioration of cardiac function in critically ill infants. The ultrashort‐acting beta‐blocker landiolol hydrochloride is a new pharmacological option for a selective heart rate (HR) control in patients with sinus tachycardia and heart failure. METHODS AND RESULTS: This study was a monocentric retrospective medical chart review study at the University Children's Hospital Bonn (Germany) from 01 January 2018 until 30 June 2020. This study included a cohort of 62 term and preterm infants with a diagnosis of ventricular dysfunction and/or pulmonary hypertension (PH), in combination with preexisting tachycardia and treatment with landiolol hydrochloride. Infants were allocated to subgroups according to weeks of gestational age (GA): born at <35 weeks of GA (Group A) and born at >35 weeks of GA (Group B). Tachycardia was defined depending on GA (<35 weeks of GA: >170 b.p.m.; [Formula: see text] 35 weeks of GA: >150 b.p.m.). The primary endpoint was defined as percentage of patients achieving HR normalization during the first 24 h of landiolol treatment. Twenty‐nine infants were allocated to Group A and 33 infants to Group B. The overall median GA of the infants was 35.3 (23.3/41.3), with 53% female infants. The primary endpoint was achieved in 57 patients (91.9%). The median time to reach target HR was 1.8 (0.3–24) h. The median starting dose of landiolol was 8.8 (3.9–25.3) μk/kg/min, with a median dosing during the first 24 h of landiolol treatment of 9.9 (2.8–35.4) μk/kg/min. The median landiolol dose while achieving the target HR was 10 (2.4–44.4) μk/kg/min. The right ventricular dysfunction improved significantly in both groups 24 h after onset of landiolol infusion (P = 0.001 in Group A and P = 0.045 in Group B). The left ventricular and biventricular dysfunction improved significantly 24 h after onset of landiolol infusion in infants of Group B (P = 0.004 and P = 0.006, respectively). The severity of PH improved significantly after 24 h in infants of Group A (P < 0.001). During landiolol treatment, no severe drug‐related adverse event was noted. CONCLUSIONS: The use of landiolol hydrochloride for HR control of non‐arrhythmic tachycardia in critically ill infants is well tolerated. Reduction of HR can be guided quickly and landiolol treatment is associated with an improvement of ventricular dysfunction and PH.