Texas Children's Hospital cuts waitlist times for pediatric heart transplant patients

Long waitlist times often lead to a higher risk of death for children awaiting heart transplantation. However, the team at Texas Children's Hospital, Houston, cut wait times by revising their waitlist protocols for donor heart size and patient severity status. Results from this intervention were presented today at the 2015 American College of Surgeons National Surgical Quality Improvement Program (ACS NSQIP®) Conference in Chicago.

As of July 2, 2015, more than 320 children nationwide were listed as candidates for heart transplantation, according to the Organ Procurement and Transplantation Network,¹ the national database of people listed for organ transplant, managed by the United Network for Organ Sharing (UNOS).

Heart transplants pose a specific problem in terms of supply and demand. Unlike other organs, such as livers or kidneys, hearts can only be received from deceased donors. Children on the waitlist are prioritized by severity and matched by size to the donor. Previous research has found that up to 17 percent of pediatric heart transplant candidates die on the waitlist and the risk of dying increases the longer one has to wait, thus, the imperative to reduce waitlist time.

Patients at Texas Children's had a median wait time of 128 days in 2013, the team reported. "In an attempt to decrease waitlist time, we felt it imperative to review our current practice for listing patients and identify potential areas for improvement," said Diana Orosco, RN, heart transplant coordinator at the hospital.

"We asked ourselves, 'Are we being too conservative institutionally with respect to some of the parameters we're using to list our patients?'" explained William J. Dreyer, MD, medical director for the hospital's cardiac transplant program.

The hospital's heart transplant team revised two protocols for this quality improvement (QI) initiative. One focused on expanding the donor size parameters to increase the pool of possible donor hearts available for patients.

The second parameter focused on patient severity status. Heart transplant candidates with the most severe conditions are given an urgency status of 1A. Those with a status of 1B or 2 are considered less urgent and often wait longer for a matching organ.

"Some of our patients don't strictly meet the entry criteria for a 1A or 1B listing status based on the type of illness they have and how they may be managed," Dr. Dreyer explained. "However, a child who doesn't meet the criteria but who is severely ill can undergo an appeal process with the UNOS regional review board."

As part of this QI initiative, the heart transplant team became more proactive about appealing to the UNOS regional review board to assign patients a higher severity status when clinically appropriate.

From January to December 2014, 32 patients - from neonates to teenagers - received a heart transplant at Texas Children's. The team used the Organ Procurement and Transplantation Network database to determine how adjustments on size parameters and appealing for higher listing status impacted wait times.