Objective Bivalirudin has been suggested as an alternative to heparin for anticoagulation in patients receiving extracorporeal membrane oxygenation (ECMO). Nevertheless, there is limited evidence about the benefit of bivalirudin in ECMO patients compared with heparin. Hence, we conducted a meta-analysis to assess the effect of bivalirudin versus heparin on clinical outcomes in patients receiving ECMO. Methods PubMed, Embase, and the Cochrane Library were systematically searched from inception up to 1 April 2022 for cohort studies and randomized controlled trials comparing bivalirudin versus heparin in patients who received ECMO. The primary outcome was short-term death. Secondary outcomes included thrombotic events and bleeding events. Results We selected 12 retrospective cohort studies with 1232 ECMO patients focusing on bivalirudin anticoagulation (n = 497) versus heparin anticoagulation (n = 735). Two hundred and one of 497 patients (40.4%) in the bivalirudin group versus 350 of 735 patients (47.6%) in the heparin group did not survive to hospital discharge. Compared with the heparin group, bivalirudin anticoagulation did not significantly decrease in-hospital mortality in patients receiving ECMO (RR, 0.95; 95% CI, 0.79–1.13; p = 0.546). Fifty-seven of 374 patients (15.2%) in the bivalirudin versus 99 of 381 patients (26.0%) in the heparin group suffered from thrombotic events. Compared with the heparin group, bivalirudin anticoagulation did not significantly decrease the rate of thrombotic events for patients receiving ECMO (RR, 0.78; 95% CI, 0.45–1.35; p = 0.378). However, bivalirudin anticoagulation significantly decreased the incidence of bleeding events compared to the heparin group (RR, 0.48; 95% CI, 0.25–0.95; p = 0.035). Conclusions Compared with heparin anticoagulation, bivalirudin did not decrease the rates of short-term mortality and thrombotic events, but reduced the incidence of bleeding events in patients receiving ECMO.

Objective: Intra-aortic balloon pump (IABP) is currently recommended as a strategy to address the increased afterload in patients who received venoarterial extracorporeal membrane oxygenation (VA-ECMO). The benefit of VA-ECMO with IABP in postcardiotomy cardiogenic shock is inconclusive. A systematic review and meta-analysis was conducted to assess the influence of VA-ECMO with IABP for postcardiotomy cardiogenic shock (PCS). Methods: The Cochrane Library, PubMed, and Embase were searched for all articles published from 1 January, 1964 to July 11, 2020. Retrospective cohort studies targeting the comparison of VA-ECMO with IABP and isolated VA-ECMO were included in this study. Results: We included 2251 patients in the present study (917 patients in the VA-ECMO with IABP group and 1334 patients in the isolated VA-ECMO group). Deaths occurred in 589 of 917 patients (64.2%) in the VA-ECMO with IABP group and occurred in 885 of 1334 patients (66.3%) in isolated VA-ECMO group. Pooling the results of all studies showed that VA-ECMO with IABP was not related to a reduced in-hospital mortality in patients who received VA-ECMO for PCS (RR, 0.95; 95% CI, 0.86–1.04; p = 0.231). In addition, VA-ECMO with IABP was not related to an increased rate of VA-ECMO weaning in patients who received VA-ECMO for PCS (RR, 1.28; 95% CI, 0.99–1.66; p = 0.058). Conclusions: This study indicates that VA-ECMO with IABP did not improve either in-hospital survival or weaning for VA-ECMO in postcardiotomy cardiogenic shock patients.

The purpose of this study was to explore the establishment of an auxiliary scoring model for patients with acute pulmonary embolism (APE) complicated with atrial fibrillation (AF) based on random forest (RF) and its application effect. A retrospective analysis was performed on the general data, underlying diseases, laboratory indicators, and cardiac indicators of 100 patients with APE admitted to our hospital from 2018 to 2021. The occurrence of atrial fibrillation in patients with pulmonary embolism was taken as a categorical variable, and the general data, underlying diseases, laboratory indicators, and cardiac indicators were taken as input variables. Then, the risk auxiliary scoring model for patients with APE complicated with AF was established based on RF and logistic regression. Finally, the accuracy, sensitivity, specificity, recall rate, accuracy, F1 value, and the receiver operator characteristic (ROC) curve were used to evaluate the predictive value of the models. After statistical analysis, the optimal node value was 3 and the optimal number of decision trees was 500 in the RF model. The importance of predictors in descending order were Hcy, diabetes mellitus, FT3 level, UA level, left atrial diameter, hypertension, and smoking history. The prediction accuracy of the RF model was 0.934, sensitivity 0.966, specificity 0.876, recall rate 0.9660, accuracy 0.934, and F1 value 0.950. The logistic regression model prediction accuracy was 0.816, sensitivity 0.915, specificity 0.125, recall rate 0.902, accuracy 0.811, and F1 value 0.896. The RF model and logistic regression prediction model AUC values were 0.984 and 0.883, respectively. From this, we conclude that the RF model was better than the logistic regression model in predicting AF in APE patients. So, the RF model had the clinical application value.

Macleaya cordata is a Chinese herbal medicine containing a variety of highly cardiotoxic alkaloids, and might result in cardiac failure. Venous-arterial Extracorporeal membrane oxygenation (VA-ECMO) could be used as a therapeutic option in patients poisoned by Macleaya cordata complicating refractory cardiogenic shock or cardiac arrest. A 60-year-old man suffered from severe arrhythmia, cardiogenic shock and cardiac arrest after consuming Macleaya cordata. The patient received VA-ECMO support in the emergency department at 5 hours after hospitalization, and was weaned from VA-ECMO on day 4, and was discharged with complete clinical improvement on Day 12. VA-ECMO is an effective method in treating cardiogenic shock or cardiac arrest induced by severe poisoning from Chinese herbal medicine. Timely and appropriate interventions with venoarterial extracorporeal membrane oxygenation devices could improve clinical outcomes in these patients.