Resilience in children with congenital heart disease: a comparative study with health counterparts

Objective Resilience is a complex, yet rather unexplored topic in patients with congenital heart disease (CHD). The goal of this study was to assess and compare resilience in children with CHD with healthy controls during the COVID-19 pandemic. Design and patients From June 2020 to June 2021, 124 children with various CHDs (14.6 +/- 2.1 years, 49 girls) and 124 matched healthy controls (14.8 +/- 2.0 years, 49 girls) completed the Resilience Scale-11 short version. Results Resilience was significantly reduced in children with CHD compared with healthy controls (CHD: 59.0 +/- 10.0 vs healthy controls: 64.4 +/- 6.5, p<0.001). That reduction was prominent in all CHD subgroups except those with left heart obstruction (aortic stenosis and coarctation of the aorta) and patients with transposition of the great arteries. Complex CHD had the lowest resilience of 57.6 +/- 8.4 (p<0.001) after adjusting for age and sex according to group differences. There was no difference between native CHD and CHD with open-heart surgery (native: 59.5 +/- 12.2 vs surgery: 58.8 +/- 9.3, p=0.758). Conclusions Resilience was reduced in children and adolescents with CHD compared with healthy peers during the COVID-19 pandemic. Children with complex severity appeared to be particularly affected. These findings emphasise continued efforts to provide a holistic and multidisciplinary approach in medical aftercare of these patients and their families.