Success

This 50 day old child was brought with a condition known as Congenital Transposition of Great Arteries. In the normal heart the impure blood returning from various parts of the body, comes to the right side of the heart, from which it is pumped into the lungs,through Pulmonary artery.There it gets purified and returns to the left side of the heart, from where it is pumped out to various parts of the body through the great artery calledAorta. In Transposition of great arteries, these biggest arteries of the body,Aorta and Pulmonary artery are wrongly connected to the heart.That is Pulmonary artery is connected to the Left side and the Aorta is connected to the right side of the heart.So proper purification of the blood dosen't take place. The impure blood gets recirculated.This results in the bluish discolouration of the body, known as cyanosis.Left alone this is not compatible with life.

This baby was operated and underwent Arterial switch operation which is a curative procedure.In this the arteries are transected and reconnected correctly to the appropriate chambers.When the surgery is done early in the life, it gives good result.Once you delay, beyond a limit, the child cannot be offered curative surgery. Thus early detection and immediate intervention has helped this child to have a normal life in future. This surgery required Rs.70,000/- as total package at Sri Ramakrishna Hospital.The picture of this baby playing now presents a rosy picture, but there are so many children who has this condition but goes without proper diagnosis and dies prematurely. Yet many unfortunate children has the diagnosis but doesn't have financial resources to get it operated, and thus misses the boat.

This child had a hole in the heart, known as Ventricular septal defect. In this condition there is a hole in the partition which separates the right and left ventricles.This condition is notorious in that the blood will mix between two chambers and the left ventricle will pump in blood into the right chamber because of the pressure difference between the two.This causes excessive volume load on left chamber and on the circulation in the Lung.The after effect is that it can cause the left chamber to fail and an increase in the blood pressure in Pulmonary arteries known as Pulmonary hypertension.

When the pulmonary blood pressure goes beyond a limit it can be detrimental to the life of the child.The hole has to be closed early otherwise in many situations irreversible changes occur in the circulation of the lung, so that closure afterwards may not benefit the child. Here again this child was lucky to get the surgery done successfully.It cost Rs.60,000/-.Many children with Ventricular septal defects, due to lack of resources and ignorance on part of parents and lack of facilities for detection, will not get intervention at the appropriate time leading to premature death.

These two children had hole in the heart in the partition which separates the two upper chambers, called Atria.This type of hole is called Atrial septal defect. Since the pressure difference between the two chambers of atria are not high the shunt across the defect will not be very high.

Hence the child would not feel sick.The only symptom at times will be frequent respiratory infection.Because they are asymptomatic they may prolong intervention.The ideal age to get operated for this condition is young age around 5 years.Delaying the surgery may lead to rhythm abnormalities in adulthood.