11 month Orissa baby undergoes Double switch heart surgery to get a new life at Wockhardt Hospitals, Bangalore

The Pediatric cardiac team at Wockhardt Hospitals has written a new chapter in the history of Pediatric Heart Surgery in India. An 11 month old baby girl from Orissa has become a rare case to be successfully operated for Congenitally Corrected Transposition of Great Arteries (CCTGA) which occurs in less than 1% of children born with heart defects. The Pediatric cardiac team at Wockhardt Hospitals led by Dr. Devananda, Consultant Cardiac Surgeon successfully completed this six hour surgery on the little baby without any complications.

Baby Pinky (name changed) who is the second child in the family was observed to have breathing difficulty in her second month and upon consultation with the local doctors in Orissa they were referred to Bangalore for further consultation and treatment. The family visited a couple of renowned hospitals in Bangalore but the hospitals had no surgical solution to offer and refused to operate upon the child due to the complexity of the case. That is when the child was brought to Wockhardt Hospitals.

The diagnosis by the doctors at Wockhardt Hospitals revealed that the baby was born with ventricular septral defect and straddling tricuspid valve. In this case the pumping chambers (ventricles) are switched along with the great arteries (aorta and pulmonary artery). The baby also had a large hole in between the ventricles and encroaching of one of the valves across the hole. Children born with this kind of defect might also have abnormal electrical conduction system which means they might be highly susceptible to a complete heart block.

Explaining the case Dr. Devananda, Consultant Cardiac Surgeon, Wockhardt Hospitals said, “This is one of the rarest cases we have observed in congenital heart defects where the chambers along with the arteries were in the reversed position. Since it was a complex case we had to perform three cardiac procedures on the baby in one sitting. First we had to do the closure of the VSD (ventricular septal defect) in such a way that the encroachment of the valve should not hamper the blood flow. Secondly, we redirected the pure and impure blood to the respective normal ventricles (atrial switch) and thirdly we switched the great arteries to the respective ventricles (arterial switch).” This complex condition is seen in less than 1% of all children born with heart defects.

The baby can lead a normal life and will not require any further surgical treatment” said Dr Devananda. The treatment was done at a subsidized cost at the hospital and was supported by the Needy Heart Foundation.