Emergency Department Evaluation of the Pediatric Heart Transplant Recipient

With an increasing number of pediatric heart transplant patients, it is inevitable that they will seek medical care at an emergency department for cardiac or noncardiac complaints. Given the special issues associated with transplant (some of which are similar to other organ transplants and some of which are unique to cardiac transplantation), the emergency care provider should have an understanding of what care can be independently provided, concerns which may require additional testing or expertise, and when to call the cardiac consultant. The goal of this review is to address these issues.