COUNCIL ON PEDIATRIC & CONGENITAL HEART DISEASE COMMUNICATION

The 24th Annual ASE Scientific Sessions—The Pediatric & Congenital HeartDisease Program is a ‘‘Can’t Miss’’ Event for 2013!

BenjaminEidem,MD,Council Chair

Luc Mertens, MD,PhD,Chair of 2013Pe-diatric and CongenitalHeart Disease Track

The Pediatric & Congenital Heart Disease track planned forMinne-apolis is truly a ‘‘can’t miss’’ event for anyone with an interest in con-genital heart disease, we wanted to highlight the upcoming programin our quarterly council communication.

This year’s program begins on Saturday with what has become oneof the most well-attended and informative sessions: Echocardio-graphic—Pathologic—Surgical Correlations in Congenital Heart Disease.This full-day program includes excellent talks from renownedechocar-diographers, cardiac pathologists, and cardiovascular surgeons that areapplicable to congenital and adult sonographers and physicians alike.Topics this year include atrial septal defects, functionally single ventri-cles, and double outlet right ventricle. Following these sessions, the dayconcludes with another favorite: Pediatric Echo Jeopardy. This year’sevent will have teams from the U.S. competing with Team Canadaand Team Europe. Echo Jeopardy an informative and highly entertain-ing game each year, and this year’s program will be no exception.

Sunday’s congenital sessions highlight new technologies in pediat-ric imaging. A joint ASE/EAE session will discuss emerging imagingtechnologies including 3D strain, flow particle velocity imaging,high resolution vascular ultrasound, and high frequency 3Dechocardiography. A focus will be on taking these novel imaging tech-nologies from the research bench to the bedside. Topics include strainimaging for ventricular functional assessment in daily practice, 3D im-aging to assess atrioventricular valve regurgitation in the operatingroom, and the assessment of mechanical dyssynchrony in pediatricpatients. A case based session on Hypoplastic Left Heart Syndrome con-cludes the day. This interactive session will involve cases from stage 1through stage 3 surgical palliation of HLHS, with speakers from sixhigh volume institutions sharing their expertise.

Monday’s congenital track includes a combined adult and pediatricsession on the assessment of diastolic function. Talks addressing thegrading of diastolic dysfunction and the assessment of filling pressureswill be discussed, as well as a comparison of the adult and pediatricparadigms used to assess the diastolic properties of the left ventricle.The use of imaging to assess patients with a failing Fontan circulation isalso a very important session. Lectures include the non-invasive as-sessment of the pulmonary circulation pathways, evaluation of the en-teric circulation in patients with protein losing enteropathy, and howto quantitatively assess the systolic and diastolic function of the singleventricle. Fetal echocardiography is always a favorite at the Scientific

40A Journal of the American Society of Echocardiography

Sessions, and thisyear’s congenitaltrack will highlightfetal hyperoxia.Talks includecoverage of themethodology andphysiology of hy-peroxia and alsothe use of non-invasive imaging toassess the fetal re-sponse to this ther-apy. A case based

session on the use of echocardiography in clinical decision making isalso planned. We’ll end the day onMonday with another crowd favor-ite: the FiresideChat, a highly interactive andentertaining interviewwithone of the luminaries of pediatric echocardiography. Begun in 2009,previous esteemed interviewees have included Roberta Williams,Richard Van Praagh, Abraham Rudolph and Norman Silverman. Thisyear’s honoree is another giant in our field—Jeff Smallhorn. Jeff willbe interviewed by Luc Mertens in what is sure to be an amazing con-cluding session for the day and truly a ‘‘can’t miss’’ event.

A ticketed breakfast begins the final day of the scientific sessions.This breakfast session, entitled How to Run an Efficient Pediatric EchoLab, will address resource utilization within the pediatric echo lab,including issues related to work flow, equipment and personnel.Oral abstract presentations are a consistent feature of the pediatricsessions and will follow this breakfast session. Completing thecongenital program will be another favorite session: Controversiesin Pediatric Echocardiography. There will be 3 spirited controversiescovered this year: (1) Point of care echocardiography should bepracticed in the pediatric emergency room; (2) All measurementsof cardiac dimensions should use 2D and not m-mode imaging;and (3) 3D echocardiography can replace cardiac MRI for measure-ment of RV volumes.

In conclusion, the 2013 Pediatric and Congenital Heart Diseasetrack at the 24th Annual ASE Scientific sessions will be a highly infor-mative, educational, and entertaining event. We look forward to see-ing everyone in Minneapolis this summer!

Volume 26 Number 3