Congenital Heart Disease Open Heart Surgery For Babies and Toddlers
On 1 December 2002 I had little exposure to heart disease however only 10 days later was at the Pediatric Intensive Care Unit (PICU) bedside of our newborn baby who required lifesaving open heart surgery.
Whilst many diseases are extremely well known, the following are little known facts:
Heart defects are present in 1 in 100 babies
Heart disease in children is the leading cause of childhood death in Australia accounting for 30% of all child deaths.
Nearly twice as many children die of congenital heart disease compared to all childhood cancers
In 80% of cases the cause is largely unknown.
The amazing thing is how far medicine and surgery has progressed to allow a second chance for many babies like ours that only 20 years ago would not have survived.
Whilst there is a myriad of different abnormalities that can occur, our newborn baby required reconstruction for a coarctation of the aortic arch, reconstruction of both the aortic and mitral valves and closing of a Ventricular Septal Defect (VSD).
The mitral and aortic valves were narrow and the...
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