UCLA

Nutrition Bytes

Title
Nutritional Management of Children with Congenital Heart Disease

Permalink
https://escholarship.org/uc/item/6jh767ps

Journal
Nutrition Bytes, 8(2)

ISSN
1548-4327

Author
Wheat, Jeffrey C.

Publication Date
2002

Peer reviewed

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Congenital heart disease (CHD) refers to any anatomic defect in the heart or major blood
vessels that is present in children at birth. CHD occurs in approximately 1% of live births
in developed countries. Infants and children with CHD exhibit a range of delays in
weight gain and growth. In some instances the delay can be relatively mild, whereas in
other cases, the failure to thrive can result in permanent physical or developmental
impairment (1,2). While the cause of abnormal growth and development is multifactorial,
reduced energy consumption and increased energy expenditure, or both, may be the most
important players (1,2,3). Aggressive feeding strategies must be employed early with
these children in order to prevent permanent growth disturbances. This paper will discuss
the recent research into the mechanisms by which congenital cardiac abnormalities cause
growth retardation as well as strategies to help these children achieve normal weight.

Causes of Growth Disturbances

Decreased Energy Intake:

Inadequate caloric intake has been shown to be the most important cause of growth
disturbances in children with CHD (4). Hansen and Dorup (5) showed that caloric intake
in CHD patients was 76% that of normal age matched controls. When calories consumed
are viewed in relation to actual body weight, intake was 88% of that recommended by the
FAO/WHO/UNU. However, this last statistic may be inflated since the children are likely
to be underweight to begin with, therefore a diet based on actual weight may
underestimate caloric needs. Rather the diet should be based on the normal intake for
children of the same age.

Several possibilities have been proposed to explain the decreased intake in these patients
including fatigue upon feeding and malabsorption (3,4). Chronic hypoxia leads to both
dypsnea and tachypnea during feeding causing the child to tire easily and thus reduce the
quantity of food consumed. Furthermore, since anorexia is a recognized symptom of
cardiac failure in adults, it is reasonable to think that this may also be a mechanism of
reduced intake for children with CHD (6). Malabsorption is sometimes seen in children
with CHD due to intestinal dysfunction from reduced blood flow to and from the
splanchnic circulation. This suggests that even children with CHD whose caloric intake is
normal for their age may not be receiving enough calories to achieve normal weight.
While there is still considerable controversy regarding the role of malabsorption in
growth disturbances (if any), this mechanism should be considered until further research
is presented (3,4,6).

One recent study has shown that glucose may be the most important component of the
diet with respect to calories because disorders of carbohydrate metabolism are commonly
seen in patients with CHD (9). These patients were found to have lower fasting glucose
levels (p=0.025) and elevated insulin secretion rates. Although the reason for this is not
clear, it could be related to higher levels of circulating catecholamines or a switch from
fatty acid b-oxidation to glycolytic metabolism, which is inefficient and uses more of the
available glucose (6). This raises the possibility that CHD patients are chronically
hypoglycemic which could contribute to the fatigue they experience while feeding.

Increased Energy Expenditure:

Infants with failure to thrive due to ventricular septal defects (VSD) have been shown to
have a 40% elevation in total energy expenditure (TEE). Surprisingly, resting energy
expenditure (REE) was found to be the same between control and VSD children. The
difference between REE and TEE was 2.5 times greater in the VSD group than control
indicating that their energy during activity is much greater (7). In patients with a VSD
there is significant mixing of venous and arterial blood reducing the arterial oxygen
saturation. While at rest, this is not a problem and therefore the REE does not increase.
However when active, they are not able to deliver enough oxygen to their tissues and
must switch to anaerobic metabolism which is inefficient and causes increased energy
expenditure.

Children with CHD in which there is congestive heart failure or an increase in afterload
(coarctation of the aorta or pulmonary hypertension) often present with increased REE
(3,6,8). This is because the heart must work much harder in order to pump an adequate
amount of blood against a greater opposing force. In contrast to VSD, this type of lesion
leads to a more inefficient use of energy at all times including rest and therefore the REE
is elevated.

Another reason for the increased metabolic rate seen in children with CHD is due to their
body composition. Due to decreased caloric intake and greater energy expenditure, they
have less energy available for fat deposition. As a result, they have an elevated
percentage of lean body mass which tends to increase their basal metabolic rate (8). In
this case, an increased metabolic rate is causing a further increase in metabolic rate,
which if left untreated can dramatically worsen the child's overall health status.

Treatment of Growth Disturbances

Structured Feeding Programs:

Due to the fact that inadequate caloric intake is the leading cause of growth disturbance
in this population, it seems logical that increasing the number of calories consumed
would have a positive effect on growth and development. Unger, et al., showed that
dietary intervention including nutritional analysis and counseling increased mean intake
from 90% to 104% of the RDA for calories and increased weight from 83.1% to 88.3% of
ideal body weight (10). The fact that counseling alone was enough to increase the caloric
intake and weight in these children suggests that there is a definite role for a parental
education from a dietitian to optimize feeding.

While some children may be able to benefit from nutritional counseling alone, other
children are incapable of consuming larger quantities of food due to the high energy costs
of eating. In order to overcome this, Jackson and Poskitt have proposed supplementing
formula or breast milk with glucose polymers (11). The authors increased mean energy
intake by 31.7% resulting in a weight gain improvement from 1.3 g/kg/day in controls to
5.8 g/kg/day with high energy feeding. However, there are problems with this method.
Another study found that feeding malnourished children high-energy formula may
stimulate greater diet induced thermogenesis and increase metabolic inefficiency
canceling some of the positive effect (8). Furthermore, these children may not be able to
tolerate the concentrated glucose needed to allow for weight catch up and should be
monitored closely when on such a feeding program.

Despite the most aggressive feeding programs, some children are still unable to ingest
enough calories in order to achieve or maintain a normal body weight. In these patients, it
may be advisable to provide enteral (direct gastric) nutritional support through a
continuous food pump. One study has shown that percutaneous endoscopic gastrotomy
(PEG) is a safe method to deliver calories to children who are severely malnourished due
to CHD (12). This method of feeding has the advantage that the child does not need to
expend any energy to feed and therefore more is available for growth. In another study it
was shown that nutritional treatment with PEG could be used to prevent growth
disturbances in newborns with CHD (13). In this study of 13 patients, 12 had normal
growth rates for their age. This is far above the normal growth rate for children with
CHD on traditional feeding programs suggesting that prophylactic enteral nutrition may
be indicated in patients with CHD even before growth disturbances become apparent
(12,13).

Breast vs. Bottle Feeding:

The decision of whether to breast or bottle feed an infant is very important for both the
child and parents. Most people are aware that when possible, breast feeding is best
because it helps foster the bond between mother and child as well as providing the best
source of nutrients. However, many parents feel that breast feeding may be too difficult
for children with CHD and instead, opt to bottle feed either with breast milk or formula.
Furthermore, many parents believe that by bottle feeding they can control the flow rate
and therefore deliver more volume with less effort. Surprisingly however, Marino, et al.,
have shown that oxygen saturations in infants with CHD were lower in the group that
was bottle feeding than the group that was breast feeding (p < 0.0001) indicating that it is
less stressful for the infant to breast feed than bottle feed (14). It is important to note,
however, that both the CHD patients with breast and bottle feeding had a lower oxygen
saturation than either group of control infants suggesting that the main cause of food
refusal is cardiac. Nevertheless, it is important to consider a potential contribution of non-
cardiac factors such as parent-child interaction during feeding. Clemente, et al., showed
that mothers of infants with CHD experienced more anxiety during feeding than mothers
of control infants which could negatively affect feeding (15). For this reason, it is very
important that mothers of children with CHD receive additional support and education in
breast feeding techniques to reduce stress and increase success.

One potential problem with breast feeding exclusively in children with CHD is that it
contradicts other studies that show increased weight gain in children on high energy
supplemented breast milk or formula (11). The answer to this question of breast or bottle
feeding is not simple and depends heavily on the type of lesion the child suffers from. In
infants with cyanotic lesions, it is most important to keep their oxygen saturation as high
as possible and therefore it may be necessary to breast feed at the expense of energy
needs. Conversely, in children with acyanotic lesions it may be perfectly acceptable to
bottle feed as this will have little adverse effect on oxygen saturation. In summary, the
strategy used to feed infants with CHD is case dependent and therefore requires the
cooperation of parents, pediatricians and other health care professionals to develop the
best approach.

Surgical Correction:

Most children with CHD eventually require surgical correction of their defect. In most
cases, surgical correction is performed as soon as possible after the child reaches ideal
weight. When infants fail to thrive despite an aggressive nutritional program, it may be
advisable to operate despite the increased mortality and morbidity associated with cardiac
surgery in underweight infants (6). Two recent studies have shown that surgical
correction of the defect lowered energy expenditures in the children, one of the main
causes of failure to thrive. Mitchell, et al., (16), showed that one week after surgical
correction there was a significant (p<.001) reduction in energy expenditure compared to
preoperative values as well as values for control children not undergoing surgery. This
shows that it may be advisable to operate on children that are not at ideal weight after all
other measures have been exhausted. In another study (17), the authors showed that five
years after surgery, energy expenditure (REE and TEE) is normal compared to a control
group. This indicates that surgical correction is a cure for failure to thrive secondary to
CHD and should be done as soon as possible in order to prevent permanent damage from
malnutrition.

Conclusion

Failure to thrive is well recognized as a serious problem in children with CHD. In caring
for these children, it is important to develop a nutritional strategy that takes into account
all of the factors at play, both physical and psychological. Due to the differences between
congenital cardiac lesions and the mechanisms by which they retard growth, no single
strategy will be adequate to treat all cases. Therefore, there must be a concerted effort
between parents, physicians, nurses and other healthcare professionals to develop a plan
that will be appropriate on an individual basis. However, in order for this to be
accomplished, further research is needed to better identify specific patterns of growth
failure as well as to identify the most effective interventions to treat different causes of
growth failure.

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