Procedural closure of the patent ductus arteriosus in preterm infants: a clinical practice guideline

Transcatheter closure of the patent ductus arteriosus (PDA) is being increasingly adopted as an alternative to surgical PDA closure in preterm infants.

To develop rigorous clinical practice guideline recommendations on procedural PDA closure in preterm infants.

The principles of the GRADE (Grading of Recommendations Assessment, Development and Evaluation) Evidence-to-Decision (EtD) framework were used to develop the guideline recommendations. An e-Delphi survey of 45 experts was conducted and recommendations that reached ≥75% agreement were accepted as consensus.

Procedural PDA closure may be considered in extremely preterm infants (<28 weeks gestational age) requiring invasive mechanical ventilation >10 postnatal days and confirmed to have a large hemodynamically significant PDA, at centers with high local rates of death and/or bronchopulmonary dysplasia (conditional recommendation). If sufficient institutional expertise is available and patient characteristics are suitable, transcatheter PDA closure may be considered as the preferred approach over PDA ligation (conditional recommendation).