Undiagnosed Congenital Heart Diseas in Children: Optimal Screening

A congenital heart disease refers to any anomaly of the heart structure (walls, valves) or to any abnormality of the heart vessels. Undiagnosed congenital heart diseases could lead to severe comorbidities and death. The purpose of our study is to highlight the importance of prenatal care in identifying possible intrauterine cardiac malformations and the necessity of cardiac screening in the first month of life.

Our retrospective study (January 2016-January 2017) included patients between 0 month-6 years admitted on the Pediatric Department of County Clinical Emergency Hospital of Constanta.

The gender ratio M:F was 33:25. Age distribution revealed that 1-3 years group is the most affected (39 cases), followed by 0-1 year (10 cases) and 4-6 years (9 cases).

Cardiac malformation encountered: atrial septal defect -20 cases, followed closely by ventricular septal defect – 18 cases, tetralogy of Fallot-13 cases, pulmonary stenosis-7 cases. Cyanosis was present in 13 cases.

After analyzing our results, we highlight the necessity of cardiac screening in the first month of life.