I am not a pediatrician but do take care of children in my practice as a family physician. Our inpatient service routinely follows (in consultation with pediatric cardiology), children with Kawasaki’s disease, and endocarditis. Certainly, all of us have had to deal with the newborn or young child with a murmur or a concerning family history of sudden cardiac death. All of these issues keep our pediatric cardiology colleagues in business!
Some items I have faced in a 20-minute appointment in the past 6 months include family history of Long QT syndrome, myocarditis, and abnormal sports physicals. How should a busy family physician handle these? Naturally, most still will end with a consult to a pediatric cardiologist, an EKG, and/or echocardiogram. However, a quick reference guide on these areas would be highly useful to pediatricians and family physicians alike.
Most of the pediatric apps I have reviewed here deal with peds emergencies, trauma, and the like. My pediatric emergency app of choice has been Pedi STAT. Here at iMedicalApps.com, we have reviewed Pedi STAT previously. We also included it in several “Top 10” app lists for Pediatrics and Family Medicine. Over the years, alternatives to Pedi STAT have come along including PalmPedi, BluCard, Pedi Crisis and Paediatric Emergencies. I have never seen or reviewed a pediatric cardiology app, though several textbooks exist. Dr. Elis Rochelson, a pediatric cardiology fellow, has created a free quick reference guide covering congenital and acquired pediatric heart disease.
Evidence-based medicine
The app is the creation of a pediatric cardiology fellow, Dr. Elis Rochelson. Unfortunately, we don’t know much more about the developer from the website listed on iTunes. Nonetheless, the information appears credible and when checked against UpToDate on several items was accurate. Furthermore, the ability to quickly access lists of peds normals for EKGs, drugs to avoid for Long QT and Brugada, etc. make the app very useful.
What providers would benefit from this medical app?
Pediatricians, pediatric and adult cardiologists, primary care providers, or any providers who treat pediatric patients with cardiac issues including students, PAs, NPs, emergency medicine, pediatrics, EM/peds, IM/peds, family medicine, etc.
Disclaimer: The views expressed are those of the author(s) and do not reflect the official policy of the Department of the Army, the Department of Defense or the U.S. Government.
- Price
- Free
- Likes
- Numerous equations, calculator, and peds arrest algorithm
- Wide variety of topics included from Long QT to Kawasaki’s
- Useful drug lists and pharmacotherapy section
- Dislikes
- No content on heart murmurs or structural heart disease
- Many sections of the app still under development, lacks calculators
- Not available for Android
- Overall
Perhaps a bit of a niche app in its current state, but Peds Cardiology Handbook will likely be a valuable quick reference guide to pediatricians, peds cardiologists, and primary care providers who care for children with peds cardiac conditions. The app is still undergoing development, and once finished will be even more valuable to a wider audience
- Overall Score
- 4
- User Interface
Simple, but easy to use with useful drop down sub-menus.
- Multimedia Usage
Only one working calculator and not much else, but much potential for other calculators as well as diagrams, hyperlinks, etc.
- Price
App is free.
- Real World Applicability
Peds Cardiology Handbook can efficiently assist pediatricians and peds subspecialists, as well as any primary care provider, in the basics of pediatric cardiology. The app is clearly a work in progress, and if the developer follows up with the promised updates this will be an outstanding quick reference. It unfortunately lacks some of the most common ped cardio information most valuable to general primary care, such as information on murmurs and structural heart disease.
- Device Used For Review
iPhone 8 running iOS 11.4
- Available for DownloadiPhoneiPad
