Effectiveness of pulse oximetry as screening for congenital heart disease in newborns

Neonatal screening (NT) is one of the most widely used pediatric preventive practices globally; it has also been recognized as one of the ten most valuable achievements in public health.Within this screening process, pulse oximetry has proven to be an effective, non-invasive and low-cost method, which is also well tolerated by newborns to detect congenital heart disease in the first hours of birth.Given that,the aim of this study was to identify the effectiveness of pulse oximetry as a screening for conge nital heart disease in newborns.A systematic review of controlled clinical trials and observational studies on congenital heart diseases was carried out in MEDLINE via PubMed, EMBASE via Ovid, LILACS and CENTRAL.Risk of bias assessment was performed with QUADAS-2.A narrative synthesis of the findings was made.A total of 18,345 articles were found, of which 15 met the inclusion criteria.The data were analyzed in a sample of 286,731 newborns in all the included studies.The results of the studies were published between 2015 and 2021, covering European countries,the Middle East, and the United States.The reported diagnostic accuracy analyzes indicate a specificity greater than 95%.Sensitivity had greater variability.To conclude, Pulse oximetry is a non-invasive, inexpensive and useful tool that helps in the detection of congenital heart disease in newborns.Early diagnosis can lead to more effective interventions and better neo natal outcomes.