Pediatric myocarditis carries a high risk of which complication?

• A. Dysrhythmias
• B. Hypertensive crisis
• C. Pulmonary edema
• D. Renal failure

Answer: (A)

Inflammation of the heart muscle in pediatric myocarditis often disrupts the heart’s electrical conduction system, leading to dangerous rhythm problems. This makes dysrhythmias the most concerning and high‑risk complication, because arrhythmias can rapidly compromise cardiac output and cause sudden collapse in a child.

While the condition can progress to heart failure and cause pulmonary edema, that outcome reflects worsening pump function rather than the immediate, life‑threatening electrical instability that arrhythmias produce. Hypertensive crisis isn’t a typical primary complication of myocarditis in kids, and renal failure tends to occur only in the setting of severe shock or multi‑organ failure, not as the characteristic risk of the disease itself.