COIMBATORE: Cardiologists and neonatal specialists at the city-based Sri Ramakrishna Hospital have performed a procedure to fix and widen the pulmonary valve of a three-month-old premature baby girl weighing just 860g.
The procedure – Balloon Valvuloplasty – that was performed through pinhole surgery, involved inserting a long thin tube right up to her heart through the neck, and inflating a balloon fixed to its tip.
This improved the valve to an extent that it now has only a minor narrowing.
The baby, now weighing 1.42kg, was discharged on June 4.
The hospital says there is no medical literature so far on the procedure being performed on a baby weighing lesser than 1.2kg.
In a press release, the hospital said a woman in Erode had to deliver her twins on the 26th week of pregnancy due to an emergency complication in January-end.
“While one baby died, the other was diagnosed with the heart defect, critical pulmonary stenosis.
The valve sending blood to the baby’s lungs was almost closed.” The baby was shifted to the Ramakrishna Hospital in a neonatal transport ambulance in March first week.
The critically-ill premature baby also developed multiple complications like pneumonia, sepsis, hypoglycemia, low platelets and blood transfusions, and was put on ventilation for many days.
“While all this was being handled, her valve block was becoming more severe and the heart failure was leading to low blood oxygen levels,” said paediatric cardiologist, Dr S Devaprasath.
Finally, on April 26, when the baby completed 90 days, a team of doctors performed the Balloon Pulmonary Valvuloplasty, which was risky considering the baby’s tiny size.
“The baby was then slowly removed from the ventilator support, provided heart failure medication and fed just milk.
She began gaining weight rapidly and was discharged on June 4 after we confirmed that she was now healthy and neurologically normal,” the cardiologist said.