Anesthetic protocol for right ventricular dysfunction management in heart transplantation: systematic review, development and validation

Background Right Ventricular Dysfunction (RVD) is the most frequent intraoperative hemodynamic complication in Heart Transplantation (HTx). RVD occurs in 0.04–1.0% of cardiac surgeries with cardiotomy and in 20–50% of HTx, with mortality up to 75%. No consensus has been established for how anesthesiologists should manage RVD, with management methods many times remaining unvalidated. Methods We conducted a systematic review, following PRISMA guidelines, to create an anesthetic protocol to manage RVD in HTx, using databases that include PubMed and Embase, until September 2018 based on inclusion and exclusion criteria. The articles screening for the systematic review were done two independent reviewers, in case of discrepancy, we consulted a third independent reviewer. Based on the systematic review, the anesthetic protocol was developed. The instrument selected to perform the validation of the protocol was AGREE II, for this purpose expert anesthetists were recruited to do this process. The minimum arbitration score for domains validation cutoff of AGREE II is arbitered to 70%. This study was registered at PROSPERO (115600). Results In the systematic review, 152 articles were included. We present the protocol in a flowchart with six steps based on goal-directed therapy, invasive monitoring, and transesophageal echocardiogram. Six experts judged the protocol and validated it. Conclusion The protocol has been validated by experts and new studies are needed to assess its applicability and potential benefits on major endpoints.