Estimated read time: 2-3 minutes
This archived news story is available only for your personal, non-commercial use. Information in the story may be outdated or superseded by additional information. Reading or replaying the story in its archived form does not constitute a republication of the story.
Ed Yeates reportingChildren with acquired and congenital heart disease now have a central place to go for focused care.
Called the Fetal Heart Center, it's designed to provide the best possible outcomes in an area where some families have fallen through the cracks.
The newly formed center's goal is to diagnose early, educate and prepare, coordinate care, and then seek the best long-term remedy for both the child and the parents.
At Primary Children's Medical Center, Camille Hood is undergoing an ultrasound of her unborn baby. The two great arteries in the heart are transposed, the valve on the right side never formed, and the bottom right heart chamber is too small. Fortunately, the complicated defects were diagnosed early.
Mom and dad know what to expect, and they're being directed to all the right people at the right time. Camille said, "It's not go to this doctor about this thing and somebody else about this. It's been nice. We feel comfortable that they have educated us well, that knowledge, all in one place."
Gary Hood said, "Just give us more time to prepare, more time to emotionally and financially and everything else, know what you're getting into and knowing what to expect as opposed to having this child born and then finding out about all of it."
The Fetal Heart Center involves a partnership between Primary Children's and the University of Utah hospitals.
Pediatric cardiologists, cardiothoracic surgeons and a nurse coordinator work together so that everybody, including the parents, are all on one page before and after the birth and as the child grows. Dr. Michael Puchalski, a cardiologist at Primary Children's Hospital, said, "When we looked at all of the heart disease in the intermountain region, which is a fairly significant population, we were capturing only about 33 percent."
An orchestrated plan for an outcome that will prevent death in the field or an outlying hospital, Dr. Puchalski says that's the center's agenda. And it begins with early diagnosis. Puchalski says, "We have improved our detection rate just in 18 months from 33 percent to about 50 percent to 55 percent." Puchalski wants to take that detection rate even higher to 70 percent.
The Fetal Heart Center also has an outreach program designed to train ultrasound technicians or sonographers how to identify subtle signs of a troubled heart in very early scans.
