The Department of Pediatric Cardiology at Amrita Institute of Medical Sciences (AIMS) has set up a specialised Adult Congenital Heart Disease (ACHD) clinic. The weekly clinic, functioning every Wednesday from 9 am to 5 pm, will have a specialised team of experts, including pediatric cardiologists, adult cardiologists, cardiac MRI specialists, psychologists, gynaecologists, occupational and respiratory therapists, endocrinologists and social workers. Special attention will be given to the needs of the patients and the clinic will seek to streamline the process of their check-ups and treatment during their visit to the hospital.
This is the first-of-its-kind service in the country and is expected to bring about significant improvement in the quality of healthcare for adults with congenital heart disease.
Congenital heart diseases are mostly diagnosed in infancy or early childhood. Treatment should be ideally accomplished in childhood. This is typically done through surgery or catheter-based techniques. Many of the patients need regular follow-up and may have special needs as they grow, sometimes even repeat surgeries or angioplasty. Additionally, there are many patients who could not be treated effectively in childhood due inaccessibility to such services. Such people often have many unique physical, psychological, gynaecological and endocrine problems. They are referred to as GUCH (Grown-up Congenital Heart). Their diagnosis and treatment methods are often very different from that of children with heart disease, or adults with other types of heart disease.
