Delhi: Three-month-old with rare congenital disorder gets new life after surgery 

NEW DELHI:  A three-month-old boy diagnosed with a rare congenital disorder has received a new lease of life after undergoing surgery at Apollo Hospitals, the hospital said on Tuesday. The child was born with obstructed total anomalous pulmonary venous connection (TAPV)— a defect that can change the way blood flows through the heart and lungs. It is a defect wherein the red or oxygenated blood does not reach the heart to be supplied to the body but joins the veins.

“The baby survives only due to the presence of a connection within the heart through which the red blood mixes with the blue blood. In this case, this connection was very small, and there was a narrowing in the circuit due to which the pressure in the lungs was high. As a result, the baby was blue with feeding and breathing difficulty,” the hospital authorities said.  

After his condition deteriorated, the child was admitted to a government hospital where doctors suspected a heart disease. His condition deteriorated further and he was brought to Apollo Hospital. “On admission, the child was on tube ventilation and was transferred to the ICU under the supervision of Dr Manisha Chakrabarti, senior consultant, paediatric cardiology. The baby’s echo was done and he was diagnosed with TAPV,” it added. Surgical repair was done by CTVS surgeon Rajesh Sharma on the same day, since any delay would have been fatal.

Child in ICU for 11 days
After the surgery, the child needed to be in the ICU for 11 days, till the time his heart and lung functions were normalised completely. The infant was also given aggressive respiratory therapy to normalise breathing. On May 16, the child was discharged in a healthy condition, doctors said.