Open heart surgeries on babies come of age in city

At Deenanath Mangeshkar 250-300 cardiac surgeries are being seen every year for the last few years,and Ruby Hall Clinic opened a paediatric cardiology and cardiac surgery department in January this year. According to Dr Manoj Durairaj,Director,Cardiac Surgery,Ruby Hall every month 100 children,even two-day-old babies,are detected with congenital heart defect in the OPD.

“We have screened 700 and performed at least 35 procedures involving repair of complex heart defects. Of these,14 are open heart surgeries on babies 4-5 months old. The surgery costs around Rs 1.5 to Rs 2 lakh and are done at half the cost,” says Durairaj.

“Earlier,we used to wait for babies to be 2-3 years old for open heart surgery to correct complicated heart defects like tetralogy of fallot,a serious condition that turns the baby bluish. Now we can perform the surgery on a five- to six-month-old,” says Dr Siddharth Gadage of Ruby Hall Clinic.

Dr Ranjit Jagtap,cardiac surgeon at Deenanath Mangeshkar says the past four-five years have seen surgeries on babies less than three months old and weighing 5-6 kg. “Recently,we repaired both minor and major cardiac defects of 50 babies from Gadchiroli and other districts of the tribal belt of Maharashtra free of cost,” he says.

Dr Usha Pratap,consultant paediatric cardiologist at Deenananth Mangeshkar,says the majority undergo surgery for total anomalous pulmonary venous return (TAPVR) correction. TAPVR occurs when pulmonary veins bring oxygen-rich blood back from lungs to the right side of the heart instead of the left. Surgery is done depending on how ill the baby is. Open heart surgey can be done even within six months of birth. “These surgeries are routine here and we get a lot of referrals from Latur,Solapur,Nashik and Aurangabad,” Pratap said adding that success rate is 93 per cent.

Dr Ashok Kanetkar,Professor Emeritus at B J Medical College who operates at N M Wadia Institute of Cardiology says there are few cardiac surgeons who attempt complex paediatric heart surgeries. Interventional cardiologist Dr Shirish Hiremath says angioplasty is done if no need for an open heart surgery is felt.

Managing the baby properly with an expert team is important,says Dr Parvez Inamdar,managing trustee,Inamdar Hospital who recently got a refferral from Yemen,five-month-old Rawezh Khadir Oman,for open heart surgery. The baby weighed only 5 kg. Durairaj,Dr Nikhil Hiremath and others worked to successfully operate on the baby that had atrial septal defect.