Children's heart defects are dangerous conditions that sometimes threaten the life of a child. The pathology is not always detected at the stage of pregnancy or in the hospital, the disease may not appear immediately. It is important for parents and pediatricians to identify dangerous symptoms in a timely manner and not to postpone treatment.
At-risk groups
Unfortunately, no child is immune from congenital heart disease. Particular attention should be paid to children from risk groups, namely:
- premature;
- with chromosomal abnormalities;
- multiple malformations of other organs;
- having relatives with heart defects;
- whose mother was carrying a child in a poor environmental situation, was exposed to drugs, tobacco, alcohol, infections, had earlier miscarriages and stillborn children.
The first signs of heart disease
Some heart pathologies in infants are very difficult to identify, so even congenital malformations may go unnoticed when the baby is discharged from the maternity ward.
Over time, the mother may notice that the baby is anxious during lactation, sucks sluggishly and often spits up. As a result, it does not gain weight well. The crumbs may have bouts of excitement, he often suffers from colds. This alone should cause concern for parents and a pediatrician, since apart from other diseases, such a child may have problems with the cardiovascular system.
Children usually have other symptoms as well. All of them are a reason for contacting a cardiologist. What should alert you:
- the face, feet, fingers of the child turn pale or turn blue;
- bulging is observed in the region of the heart;
- the limbs are swollen;
- the baby cries for no apparent reason, and cold sweat may appear;
- shortness of breath is observed;
- heartbeat slowed down or rapid.
Older children will be able to tell adults about their condition, for example, pain in the heart and right hypochondrium, shortness of breath and heart problems when climbing stairs, running and other physical exercises. Heart disease can be indicated by lack of appetite, poor immunity, fainting, dizziness, and headaches.
Heart murmur
Sometimes cardiac pathologies are so carefully masked that you may not notice the symptoms described above in your baby. An attentive pediatrician will suspect a defect, having heard a heart murmur during a physical examination - a whistle, a creak, some other specific sounds that are created when blood flows through the heart valves.
Such noises do not always signal illness and do not require emergency therapy. Functional specific heart sounds sometimes disappear with age. If the heart murmurs are accompanied by other alarming symptoms, or the pediatrician has heard rough pathological sounds (the so-called organic murmurs), an accurate diagnosis of heart disorders will be required.
According to medical statistics, in half of the cases, specific sounds when listening to the heartbeat indicate minor defects. They are not a threat to life and sometimes even a reason for special treatment, but the child will be registered with a cardiologist anyway.
What can be a heart defect
Unfortunately, every year doctors diagnose more and more congenital heart diseases in children, while the defects have a variety of modifications. Scientists claim the existence of about a hundred varieties of the disease. There are three main groups.
- Defects of a white type, one of the manifestations of which is pallor of the skin. In this case, there is aortic damage, pathology of the septum, blood from the arterial bloodstream is thrown into the venous one.
- Defects of the blue type are manifested by cyanosis of the skin. Cardiologists can diagnose various pathologies, for example, rearrangement of the aorta and arteries, a defect in the septum between the ventricles, vasoconstriction, etc.
- Blocked vices. This is a group of diseases, the cause of which is the obstructed outflow of blood from the ventricles of the heart.
A specialist can find a simple heart defect in a child, when any one damage is found, or a complex one, with a combined deformation of the valves and holes. If there is a whole bunch of violations, we are talking about a combined defect.
Thanks to regular medical examinations, congenital heart defects in children can be diagnosed in a timely manner and significantly improve the patient's quality of life, slow down the development of the disease. However, parents should always be attentive to the child: the defect may not appear for months or even years. In addition, to be not only congenital, but also acquired.
Acquired heart defects
Pathological changes in the work of the child's body can cause irregularities in the work of the heart and blood vessels. Experts call the main reasons for childhood acquired defects:
- chest trauma;
- infectious heart disease;
- connective tissue diseases;
- sepsis;
- rheumatism.
Children over 10 years of age most often get heart defects after suffering rheumatism. Heart wall defects are often caused by bacterial infections that are common in childhood. Common pathogens are staphylococci, streptococci, enterococci. Less commonly, other bacteria, fungi and viruses.
Diagnosis of heart disease
Ultrasound examination (ultrasound) of the heart is the main method for diagnosing heart disease. Electrocardiography (ECG) and echocardiography (ECHO KG) procedures help the doctor see the structural divisions of the organ and detect specific pathologies. In addition, a chest x-ray helps to draw conclusions about the current state of the heart.
As part of a compulsory medical examination, both a pregnant woman and an infant undergo an ultrasound scan of the heart soon after birth. However, no matter how carefully the doctor observes the pregnancy, he may not diagnose congenital pathologies in time due to the peculiarities of the blood flow of the unborn child. A crumb cardiogram may also not show any pathological changes.
At the first suspicion of a defect, parents should, without delay, register the child for a consultation with children's narrow specialists - a cardiologist and a cardiac surgeon. It is recommended to do an ECG and ECHOKG in a large cardiovascular surgery center, where specialists with extensive research experience can most accurately diagnose the disease.
What to do if a child has a heart defect?
Therapy for cardiac pathology is always strictly individual. When choosing a method for treating childhood heart disease, doctors will take into account the age and general condition of the little patient. In different cases, it is assigned:
- conservative therapy. The child will be prescribed a healthy diet rich in proteins, limited in salt intake. Physical therapy is mandatory to train the heart muscle. If necessary, medications are prescribed.
- Surgery. If an operation is indicated to correct a heart defect, it must be done at the exact time appointed by the cardiac surgeon. In most cases, surgery helps children correct the defect and even make a full recovery.
With acquired defects, it is important to remember the causes of the disease and be sure to prevent new diseases. For example, to prevent rheumatic attacks if the pathology was caused by rheumatism; treat completely infectious diseases and its complications.
A healthy lifestyle, accurate implementation of medical recommendations and, of course, the attention and love of parents, the absence of stress will surely help the child cope with the illness.
