Hole in heart can be treated without surgery in children
A pediatrician examines a baby with a stethoscope. (File Photo)


Child patients with ventricular septal defect, also known as "hole in the heart," can be treated without surgery in a Turkish medical faculty.

Evic Zeynep Akgün, a cardiologist at Kocaeli University in Turkey's Black Sea region, told Anadolu Agency (AA) that doctors could perform all the necessary operations in the clinic after the birth of the patients they followed since they were unborn babies.

"Without any surgery, without a pump or without entering the heart-lung machine, all these procedures are performed by opening a vascular access from the leg," Akgün said.

Akgün, an expert at the Department of Child Health and Diseases, went on to say that the treatment takes one to two hours and the patient can be discharged from the hospital within 24 hours.

Congenital heart defects (CHDs) are problems with the heart’s structure that are present at birth such as holes in the inside walls of the heart and narrowed or leaky valves. Having a hole in the heart is one of the most common heart diseases in babies and children around the world. Eight congenital heart diseases are detected in every 1,000 healthy births around the world.