Three patients with complex heart problems have just been given a new lease of life, thanks to the technology of 3D printing. Hari Krishna, 19, Izam Azeez, 15, and 2-month old Ram suffered from heart problems that were so complicated and severe that they were reaching life-threatening levels. Yet, conventional scanning methods were unable to...

Athmika’s mother was terrified when she first saw and held her newborn daughter. She could see her baby’s heart beating just below the skin of her chest as there was no bone covering the front of her chest. It was discovered that Athmika was born with a rare birth defect called ‘congenital absence of sternum’...

KOCHI: Paediatric cardiologists at a private hospital in Kochi relied on 3D printing technology to create a model of their 11-year-old patient’s heart prior to performing complex multiple surgeries to fix anomalies. The girl from Thrissur was diagnosed with dextrocardia (condition in which your heart points toward the right side of your chest instead of...

KOCHI: Even as cost of health care in the private sector shoots up considerably, birth defects are not covered under the existing health insurance schemes which make it financially burdensome for parents to treat their children with such defects. On the other hand, in the case of carrying mothers, the insurance companies charge hefty premium to...

KOCHI: A 15-day-old baby boy with a congenital heart problem, who was being taken in an ambulance by road from Mangaluru to Thiruvananthapuram (almost 600km away), was admitted to Amrita Institute of Medical Sciences in Kochi on Tuesday, following the intervention of health minister K K Shylaja as the child’s condition was critical. The baby,...

Kochi: The 17-day-old infant brought to Amrita Institute of Medical Sciences in Kochi from Mangaluru was subjected to a heart surgery. The procedure was successful and the baby will be shifted to the intensive care unit soon, said authorities. The treatment is being carried out under the ‘Hridyam’ project of the Kerala Government. The infant...

This could help reduce child mortality, say experts Tamil Nadu, which lowered child mortality significantly in the past decade, could further the trend by investing in technology to treat congenital heart defects (CHDs), said experts. R. Krishna Kumar, head of the Department of Cardiology at the Amrita Institute of Medical Sciences, Kochi, said India had...