At Driscoll Children’s Hospital, our care for children with heart conditions begins even before birth with a diagnosis in utero. This care extends throughout childhood to adulthood and beyond. Driscoll Children’s Hospital established Cardiothoracic Surgery Services soon after it opened its doors in 1953. In 1984, Driscoll’s Dr. James Duff performed the first successful neonatal arterial switch in Texas.
The Heart Center at Driscoll Children’s Hospital began a renewed pursuit of excellence in late 2019 under the new leadership of Dr. Stephen Langley, Medical Director and Chief of Pediatric Cardiac Surgery. We believe that low mortality and complication rates, and a short length of stay, are cornerstones of program quality.
Our Heart Center manages all types of complex congenital cardiac defects including:
Outcomes for patients with congenital heart disease across the country are collected by the Society of Thoracic Surgeons (STS). Data is subdivided into five different groups depending on the level of risk. STAT 1 includes lower risk conditions and STAT 5 the highest. This allows us to benchmark our outcomes with national data.
The overall survival rate at The Driscoll Heart Center is over 98.1%.
| Category | Number of Driscoll Patients | STS/National Mortality | Driscoll Mortality | Driscoll Survival Rate |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| STAT 1 (low risk) | 0/216 | 0.6% | 0.0% | 100% |
| STAT 2 | 2/125 | 1.9% | 1.6% | 98.4% |
| STAT 3 | 1/72 | 3.5% | 1.4% | 98.6% |
| STAT 4 | 6/81 | 7.8% | 7.4% | 92.6% |
| STAT 5 (high risk) | 1/31 | 14.7% | 3.23% | 96.8% |
| All Patients | 10/525 | 2.7% | 1.9% | 98.1% |
Our team has been very busy caring for the smallest, youngest, and highest-risk patients. Of our 525 patients, 65% were either neonates or infants - compared to 50% nationally. Fifty percent more of our patients were in the risk category STAT 4 or 5 compared to patients nationally.
Post-surgical length of stay (LOS) in hospital is expressed as a median in days. The Heart Center at Driscoll Children's Hospital has a notably shorter length of stay than the national average. This is the result of highly specialized diagnosis, collaborative presurgical planning, quality technical repair and exceptional post-op care. We believe the length of time it takes a child to recover after cardiac surgery is a surrogate marker for the quality of the entire Heart Center.
| Category | Number of Driscoll Patients | National LOS | Driscoll LOS | Driscoll LOS vs National Average |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| STAT 1 (low risk) | 216 | 11 | 4 | 7 days less |
| STAT 2 | 125 | 23 | 6 | 17 days less |
| STAT 3 | 72 | 27 | 8 | 19 days less |
| STAT 4 | 81 | 38 | 12 | 26 days less |
| STAT 5 (high risk) | 31 | 58 | 19.5 | 25.5 days less |
| All Patients | 525 | N/A | 6 | Median Driscoll LOS: 6 |
Cumulatively these 525 patients stayed in the hospital after their surgery a total of 7111 days (19.5 years) less than an equivalent average of 525 patients in the national database.
| Selected Procedures | National LOS | Driscoll LOS | Driscoll LOS vs National Average |
|---|---|---|---|
| Atrioventricular Septal Defect | 17 | 9 | 8 days less |
| Coarctation | 14 | 6 | 8 days less |
| Fontan | 12 | 8 | 4 days less |
| Glenn | 19 | 5 | 14 days less |
| Norwood | 58 | 21 | 37 days less |
| Tetralogy of Fallot | 13 | 5 | 8 days less |
| VSD | 11 | 4 | 7 days less |
Visit our surgery hub for information on all surgeries preformed at Driscoll Children's Hospital and Clinics.
Important Patient Surgery Information
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