1. Sleep apnea and Q-T interval prolongation--a particularly lethal combination.
- Author
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Smith TA, Mason JM, Bell JS, and Francisco JT
- Subjects
- Adult, Arrhythmia, Sinus complications, Cardiomegaly complications, Female, Humans, Hypoxia blood, Hypoxia complications, Hypoxia pathology, Infant, Newborn, Sudden Infant Death blood, Sudden Infant Death pathology, Apnea complications, Electrocardiography, Sudden Infant Death etiology
- Abstract
We have discovered a 20-day-old infant who possessed anatomic evidence of chronic hypoxemia with right ventricular hypertrophy and who died in hypoxic hypoxemia with a postmortem PO2 of 4 mm. Hg. Subsequently, and ECG was discovered which had been obtained at one day of age and showed Q-T interval prolongation along with T-wave alternation. We believe this case to be one of the first to substantiate the mechanism for SIDS as proposed by Schwartz, 26 with hypoxia acting synergistically with a prolonged Q-T interval causing sudden unexpected death in this infant--providing a link between cardiac and respiratory mechanisms of death.
- Published
- 1979
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