A workshop on Ventricular Septal Defect (VSD) and Device Closure will be conducted by the department of pediatric cardiology at Care Hospitals, Banjara Hills on June 7 and 8. The two day workshop will focus on ‘safe and smooth’ operating procedure of the VSD. Around 120 pediatricians from across the world will participate in the event including medics from Vietnam, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh.
The international consultant pediatric cardiology experts will demonstrate nearly 25 to 30 live operations on various methods of VSD device closures.
“An angiography can sometimes cost more than VSD with a margin of nearly `50,000. Timely detection of a hole in the septum of the heart (which separates the chambers in the organ) provides good chances of recovery. Till now we have operated on more than two hundred children. Sometimes open heart surgery leads to death but not in the case of VSD. Even adults can undergo the procedure. Of the cases registered under heart ailments across the world, 40 percent are VSDs,” said Dr. Nageswara Rao Koneti, chief pediatric cardiologist at Care Hospitals.
“The important factor to be considered before the operation is the size of the hole in the heart and the device to be used. I have worked on 400 to 500 VSD cases in Vietnam by now and most of them are children aged below three years. The cases have been on a rise all over the world, an alarming condition,” said Dr. Do N Tin, a cardiologist from Vietnam.
The surgery involves a thin, flexible tube introduced into a blood vessel in the leg that leads to the heart. The tube is guided into the heart to make measurements of blood flow, pressure and oxygen levels in the heart chambers. “A cardiologist places a special implant of flexible wire mesh, shaped into two discs which is positioned in the hole in the septum. The device is designed to flatten against the septum on both sides to close and permanently seal the VSD,” said Dr. Sudeep Verma, a pediatric cardiologist from Care Hospitals.
The surgery has multiple advantages for example no scars and low rate of infection as well as few post-operative side-effects.