Cerebral hemodynamics in neonates and infants undergoing cardiopulmonary bypass and profound hypothermic circulatory arrest: assessment by transcranial Doppler sonography.

Profound hypothermic circulatory arrest (PHCA) is followed by a transient period of increased intracranial pressure and a longer period of neurophysiologic dysfunction. To investigate the effect of cardiopulmonary bypass (CPB) with PHCA on cerebral hemodynamics, we used transcranial Doppler sonography to measure cerebral blood flow velocity in 10 neonates and infants before and after PHCA. Cerebral blood flow velocity was compared before and after PHCA during normothermic cardiopulmonary bypass at the same mean arterial pressure, central venous pressure, hematocrit, and arterial carbon dioxide tension. Cerebral blood flow velocity decreased exponentially with decreasing nasopharyngeal temperature before PHCA (P less than 0.05) and remained decreased after PHCA during normothermic CPB, compared with values for normothermic CPB before PHCA (P less than 0.005). During normothermic CPB after PHCA, the modified cerebral vascular resistance (mm Hg.cm.s-1) was increased above values for normothermic CPB before PHCA (P less than 0.05). The results of this study suggest that the observed increase in intracranial pressure during PHCA is not caused by increased cerebral perfusion, but rather that cerebral perfusion is reduced in response to a decreased demand for cerebral metabolic oxygen.