Introduction:

Alterations in cardiac conduction and bradycardia are described in Dengue, although its pathophysiology is not entirely clear.

Objective:

To describe the clinical characteristics and course of patients with dengue and bradycardia.

Methodology:

This was an observational, descriptive and longitudinal cohort study. We enrolled patients from 1 month to 18 years of age who were admitted to the Emergency Department of the Acosta Ñu Children's General Hospital with a diagnosis of dengue, who presented bradycardia and who had follow-up until the disappearance of the symptom. The variables were age, sex, dengue classification, electrocardiogram (ECG) results, chest x-ray, onset of bradycardia, heart rate at discharge, duration of bradycardia during follow-up and days of hospitalization. Data were analyzed in SPSSv 21, using descriptive statistics. The protocol was approved by the Hospital Ethics Committee.

Results:

During the study period, 310 patients with Dengue were hospitalized. 6.4% (20/310) had bradycardia. The average age was 12.7 ± 2.8 years, with a predominance of males. Some patients already had bradycardia at the time of admission (9/20), while others developed it during hospitalization (11/20). There was one case of AV block and the others presented sinus bradycardia (19/29). Bradycardia persisted at discharge in most patients (18/20) and resolved during the first week of follow-up. The average number of hospitalization days was 7.1 ± 1.9.

Conclusions:

The frequency of bradycardia was 6.4%. The majority of patients had a diagnosis of severe dengue. A high percentage of patients continued to have bradycardia at discharge with no other clinical manifestations of dengue. In the majority of patients, bradycardia presented during hospitalization and normalized at their discharge follow-up.

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