Childhood heart failure in Ibadan.

One hundred consecutive admissions of children with a diagnosis of congestive cardiac failure to the paediatric department of the University College Hospital, Ibadan were evaluated during a 10-month period. They were aged 8 days to 12 years. They constituted 5.8% of the total paediatric admissions during the study period. The most frequent underlying causes of heart failure were acute lower respiratory tract infections (36%), intrinsic heart disease (31%) and severe anaemia (28%). Other less common causes of heart failure were renal disorders (3%) and septiceamia (2%). Heart failure remains a common problem encountered in emergency paediatric practice in Nigeria, with the majority of cases resulting from preventable causes.