What should I do if my baby is born with a ventricular septal defect?

Every baby is the apple of his parents' eyes. Once the baby gets sick, the parents will definitely be very sad. We once met a friend who said that his baby was diagnosed with congenital ventricular septal defect. For parents who have no medical knowledge, this disease seems to be very serious. Today we will talk about the specific treatment methods and the best age for treatment of this disease. We hope to help parents of babies with this disease to receive timely treatment according to the specific situation of the baby.

This disease is currently well cured and can be treated through surgery or cardiac catheterization. Ventricular septal defect, like patent ductus arteriosus and atrial septal defect, is also a common congenital heart disease. The essence of this disease is that there is a defect in the septum separating the left and right ventricles during the fetal period. After birth, the blood from the left ventricle flows into the right ventricle. Unlike atrial septal defect, the pressure difference between the left ventricle and the right ventricle is very large, so the shunt volume is also large, which has a much greater impact on patients than atrial septal defect. Symptoms appear in childhood or even in infancy. If the ventricular septal defect is large, the baby will be particularly susceptible to colds or pneumonia, which will be difficult to treat, take a long course of treatment, and be prone to recurrence. In childhood, children are prone to fatigue and have poor endurance. Some children are prone to pneumonia in infancy and childhood, but rarely suffer from respiratory diseases in childhood. At this time, parents mistakenly believe that their child's condition has improved, but in fact it has worsened. The reason is that a large amount of blood from the left ventricle is shunted to the right ventricle for a long time, causing increased pulmonary vascular resistance. The amount of blood in the lungs is reduced, and the chance of lung disease is also reduced.

The best age for treatment of ventricular septal defect is roughly as follows: for small, asymptomatic ventricular septal defects, it is more appropriate to do it at 3-5 years old; for large ventricular septal defects, the younger the better, and it can be done at 2-3 months. For infants and young children who frequently suffer from pneumonia, this should be done between bouts of pneumonia. If children with ventricular septal defect do not undergo surgery as soon as possible, the risk of surgery will greatly increase when they reach a certain age due to the development of severe pulmonary hypertension, and the long-term effect will not be good. What is more serious is that some children lose the opportunity for surgery. For small ventricular septal defect of only 2-3mm, you can wait until the child is 5-6 years old to decide whether to treat it. Because in a small number of children, such ventricular septal defects can close naturally and no longer require surgery. Generally speaking, after the age of 5, the possibility of natural closure is very small. For patients with pulmonary hypertension, whether ventricular septal defect can be operated on must be decided by an experienced cardiac surgeon. Most older patients with ventricular septal defect can still be treated surgically, and they should seek diagnosis and treatment from a cardiac surgeon.

Through our introduction today, we hope that if a baby is found to have this condition, he or she can seek medical treatment in time. The older the child is, the greater the risk he or she faces. Don’t think that the child is too young and be reluctant to perform surgery on the child. This wrong idea is absolutely wrong. After a successful operation, you must also focus on postoperative recovery. I believe that through surgery, the baby will be able to recover quickly like a healthy child.