Electrocardiographic criteria for diagnosis of acute myocardial infarction in childhood.

Myocardial infarction (MI), a common occurrence in adults, is generally considered to be rare in children. Electrocardiographic criteria for diagnosis of MI in adults are well known and accepted, but no general criteria exist for children. We report 37 autopsy-proved cases of transmural MI and electrocardiographic evidence of MI in 30 of these cases. A variety of conditions previously reported to produce "pseudo-infarction" are included in these cases of MI, including myocarditis, hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, and the cardiomyopathy of Duchenne's muscular dystrophy. Compilation of the electrocardiographic data in all patients allowed for the development of criteria for this diagnosis of MI in childhood, and include wide Q waves (greater than 35 ms) with or without Q-wave notching, ST-segment elevation (greater than 2 mm), and prolonged QT interval corrected for heart rate (QTc greater than 440 ms) with accompanying Q-wave abnormalities. With use of these electrocardiographic criteria, an additional 3 patients were subsequently diagnosed prospectively with MI and confirmed on autopsy. Pathologic evaluation confirmed the location of infarction predicted by the electrocardiograms in all 3 cases.