Cardiology in the Young
- Cardiology in the Young / Volume 21 / Issue 05 / October 2011, pp 551-555
- Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2011. The online version of this article is published within an Open Access environment subject to the conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike licence <http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.5/>. The written permission of Cambridge University Press must be obtained for commercial re-use.
- DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/S1047951111000448 (About DOI), Published online: 08 June 2011
- OPEN ACCESS
Original Articles
Aortic mineralisation in children with congenital cardiac disease
Manuel A. Baños-Gonzáleza1, Juan Calderón-Colmeneroa1, Alberto Aranda-Fraustroa1, Marco A. Peña-Duquea1, Marco A. Martínez-Ríosa1, Benjamín Valente-Acostaa1, Carlos Linares-Lópeza3, Hugo Delgado-Granadosa3 and Aurora de la Peña-Díaza1a2 c1
a1 Instituto Nacional de Cardiología “Ignacio Chávez”, Grupo de Genética Intervencionista, Departamentos de Biología Molecular, Hemodinámica, Cardiología Pediátrica, Patología, México, D.F., México
a2 Departamento de Farmacología, Facultad de Medicina, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, México, D.F., México
a3 Instituto de Geofísica, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, México, D.F., Mexico
Abstract
Background Congenital cardiac diseases are the most frequent congenital malformations. In adult patients, the mineralisation of the aorta due to cardiovascular disease is very common, but vascular mineralisation in paediatric cardiopathies is a topic less studied. This study shows that children with a complex congenital cardiopathy show a high degree of vascular mineralisation in the ascending aorta. This can be part of the cardiac failure pathophysiology due to congenital cardiopathies.
Objective The aim of this study was to determine the presence and degree of vascular mineralisation in samples of the ascending and descending aorta of children with complex congenital cardiopathies.
Design We conducted a cross-sectional study.
Subjects We obtained 34 vascular tissues from the autopsies of 17 children with congenital cardiac disease.
Methods We used a scanning electron microscope with an energy-dispersive X-ray spectroscopy in order to analyse the vascular tissues.
Results The amount of minerals was two times higher in the ascending aorta than in the descending aorta of children with congenital cardiac disease.
Conclusions The study provides evidence that vascular mineralisation can start at an early age, and that it is higher in the ascending aorta than in the descending aorta.
(Received November 19 2010)
(Accepted March 03 2011)
(Online publication June 08 2011)
Correspondence:
c1 Correspondence to: A. de la Peña-Díaz, Departamento de Farmacología, Facultad de Medicina, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México. Commissioned at the Departamento de Biología Molecular, Instituto Nacional de Cardiología “Ignacio Chávez”, Juan Badiano 1, Tlalpan, 14000 México, D.F., México. Tel: (-52-55) 55 73 29 11 ext 1460; Fax: (52) 55 55 730994; E-mail: aurorade2002@yahoo.com
