Increased heart rate variability correlation between mother and child immediately pre-operation.
BACKGROUND
Maternal distress would correlate with the children's mental status, thereby influencing the activity of the autonomic nervous system (ANS) of the children and mothers. We hypothesized that pre-anesthetic maternal ANS activity, when approaching close to their children's operation time, would correlate with children's ANS activity, and that the values of heart rate variability (HRV) would correlate.


METHODS
We calculated maternal and children's HRVs and analyzed the relationship between the two. A total of 24 pairs of mother and child were analyzed. Maternal and children's HRVs were recorded from the night before the child's surgery to the arrival to the operation room.


RESULTS
The ratios of low-frequency components (LF) to high-frequency components (HF) (LF/HF ratio) of children's and maternal HRVs obtained during the immediate pre-operative period (06:00-08:00 hours) showed a significantly, positive correlation, but no correlation was found for the LF/HF ratios obtained during the pre-operative night.


CONCLUSIONS
The LF/HF ratios of HRV immediately before surgery in children and mothers showed a significant positive correlation.
Multidisciplinary Pain Center, Aichi Medical University, Aichi, Japan. arainon@aichi-med-u.ac.jp
Y-C P
YC
Arai
W
W
Ueda
T
T
Ushida
N
N
Kandatsu
H
H
Ito
T
T
Komatsu
D000328:Adult; D001007:Anxiety / Q000503:physiopathology*; D002648:Child; D002675:Child, Preschool; D004562:Electrocardiography; D005260:Female; D006339:Heart Rate / Q000502:physiology*; D006801:Humans; D007223:Infant; D008297:Male; D009035:Mothers / Q000523:psychology*; D011300:Preoperative Care; D012044:Regression Analysis; D016896:Treatment Outcome