Prevalence of Congenital Heart Disease in Sick Neonates: An Echocardiographic Evaluation

Abstract

Background: Congenital heart disease (CHD) is one of the major causes of mortality and morbidity in the paediatric population particularly in neonates and infants of both the developing and developed countries. Importance of congenital defects is more prominent in infants and delay in recognition may adversely effect survival. Objective: To find the prevalence and pattern of CHD in sick neonates in a tertiary care hospital VSSIMSAR Odisha India catering to economically backward area of our country. Methods: A prospective analysis of case of 8.856 patients (0-1 month) was conducted to ascertain the prevalence and spectrum of CHDs. Results: A total of 232 patients out of 8.856, were found having CHDs measuring a prevalence of 26.2/1000 among sick neonates. About 202 (91.3%) were the acyanotics and 20 (8.6%) were cyanotic heart patients. 4 (1.7%)were complex congenital heart disease Among the acyanotic heart diseases the most frequent lesion seen in 126 (62.7%) followed by ASD alone or in combination was detected in 76 cases (37.6 %) followed by PDA alone or in combination in around 74 cases(36.6%). Combined defects PDA and VSD in 40 cases (20.2 %). Valvular PS was observed in 3% of cases among the cyanotic heart diseases Tetralogy of Fallot was the most frequent cyanotic heart disease seen in 9 cases. Conclusion: Prevalence of congenital heart disease is very high among the sick neonates though figure of 26.2/1000 among the sick neonates could be an over estimation of the actual disease burden in our community because of high prevalence of sick children. The study heightened awareness among the treating physicians about the high prevalence of cardiac diseases in sick neonates and early recognition is essential to reduce the mortality and morbidity associated with these ailments.