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OBJECTIVES:. Cardiac surgery is frequently associated with significant postoperative bleeding. Platelet-dysfunction is the main cardiopulmonary bypass (CPB)-induced hemostatic defect. Not only the number of platelets decreases, but also the remaining are functionally impaired. Although lipid metabolism is crucial for platelet function, little is known regarding platelet metabolic changes associated with CPB-dysfunction. Our aim is to explore possible contribution of metabolic perturbations for platelet dysfunction after cardiac surgery. DESIGN:. Prospective cohort study. SETTING:. Tertiary academic cardiothoracic-surgery ICU. PATIENTS:. Thirty-three patients submitted to elective surgical aortic valve replacement. INTERVENTIONS:. Samples from patients were collected at three time points (preoperative, 6- and 24-hr postoperative). Untargeted metabolic analysis using high-performance liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry was performed to compare patients with significant postoperative bleeding with patients without hemorrhage. Principal component analyses, Wilcoxon matched-pairs signed-rank tests, adjusted to FDR, and pairwise comparison were used to identify pathways of interest. Enrichment and pathway metabolomic complemented the analyses. MEASUREMENTS AND MAIN RESULTS:. We identified a platelet-related signature based on an overrepresentation of changes in known fatty acid metabolism pathways involved in platelet function. We observed that arachidonic acid (AA) levels and other metabolites from the pathway were reduced at 6 and 24 hours, independently from antiagreggation therapy and platelet count. Concentrations of preoperative AA were inversely correlated with postoperative chest tube blood loss but were not correlated with platelet count in the preoperative, at 6 or at 24 hours. Patients with significant postoperative blood-loss had considerably lower values of AA and higher transfusion rates. Values of postoperative interleukin-6 were strongly correlated with AA variability. CONCLUSIONS AND RELEVANCE:. Our observations suggest that an inflammatory-related perturbation of AA metabolism is a signature of cardiac surgery with CPB and that preoperative levels of AA may be more relevant than platelet count to anticipate and prevent postoperative blood loss in patients submitted to cardiac surgery with CPB.

The differential diagnosis of true aneurysms and pseudoaneurysms is challenging, and multimodality cardiac imaging is often necessary. We report a case in which the limitations of these techniques are exposed, showing that post-operative evaluation of tissue layers remains the gold standard in establishing this diagnosis. (Level of Difficulty: Beginner.)

OBJECTIVES:. The Sequential Organ Failure Assessment (SOFA) score is a predictor of mortality in ICU patients. Although it is widely used and has been validated as a reliable and independent predictor of mortality and morbidity in cardiac ICU, few studies correlate early postoperative SOFA with long-term survival. DESIGN:. Retrospective observational cohort study. SETTING:. Tertiary academic cardiac surgery ICU. PATIENTS:. One-thousand three-hundred seventy-nine patients submitted to cardiac surgery. INTERVENTIONS:. SOFA 24 hours, SOFA 48 hours, mean, and highest SOFA scores were correlated with survival at 12 and 24 months. Wilcoxon tests were used to analyze differences in variables. Multivariate logistic regressions and likelihood ratio test were used to access the predictive modeling. Receiver operating characteristic curves were used to assess accuracy of the variables in separating survivor from nonsurvivors. MEASUREMENTS AND MAIN RESULTS:. Lower SOFA scores have better survival rates at 12 and 24 months. Highest SOFA and SOFA at 48 hours showed to be better predictors of outcome and to have higher accuracy in distinguishing survivors from nonsurvivors than initial SOFA and mean SOFA. A decreasing score during the first 48 hours had mortality rates of 4.9%, while an unchanged or increased score was associated with a mortality rate of 5.7%. CONCLUSIONS:. SOFA score in the ICU after cardiac surgery correlated with survival at 12 and 24 months. Patients with lower SOFA scores had higher survival rates. Differences in survival at 12 months were better correlated with the absolute value at 48 hours than with its variation. SOFA score may be useful to predict long-term outcomes and to stratify patients with higher probability of mortality.