Sant Joan de Déu and Clínic hospitals take another step in the treatment of congenital heart diseases, a group of diseases characterized by heart malformations produced during the embryonic period. After years of collaboration, both centers have promoted the Sant Joan de Déu - Clínic Barcelona Congenital Heart Disease Center, where they will comprehensively address patients throughout all stages of life.
Each year, 600 babies in Catalonia are born with some type of congenital heart disease, whether it is a structural problem of the heart or of the great vessels of the chest. It is the most frequent malformation at birth and affects 1% of newborns. A third of those affected require surgery during the first year of life. Thanks to advances in recent decades, 95% of children reach adulthood. For this reason, in Catalonia, about 10,000 adults live with these diseases, a figure that rises to 120,000 throughout Spain.
The first milestone of the new center consists of the extension of surgical techniques that until now were not applied in the pediatric field due to a matter of volume, such as robotic surgery. Compared to open surgery, in which a large cut has to be made in the chest to open the ribs and operate on the heart, robotic surgery is more precise, less invasive, and reduces the postoperative period. Currently, it is limited to children with a minimum age of 6 years and a weight of 30 kilos, taking into account that the tools used have been designed for the size of adults. It is estimated that 20% of open surgery interventions in young patients could be performed with this technique.
Robotic surgery also gives a better aesthetic result. That was what worried Iu the most, a 15-year-old boy who suffered a heart infection. "I was very scared if they opened me up because I would have a very large scar. I have a brother who has one and it's shocking to see it," he said this Monday, completely recovered two months after his intervention, one of the first performed in Spain, "I'm already living a normal life, even playing soccer." "There are no limitations and he doesn't have to take any medication, just follow annual check-ups," remarks cardiologist Esther Auresanz, who even gives him permission to do flips while playing with the ball if that's what he usually does in his daily life.
The new center will have two locations, one in Sant Joan de Déu and another in Clínic, and will be made up of a team of 23 professionals, including cardiovascular surgeons, cardiologists, pediatricians, and anesthesiologists. "They will work as a single entity," summarizes the Minister of Health, Manel Balcells. In addition to robotic cardiac surgery like Iu's and one more patient, the center has carried out three thoracoscopic surgery operations, in which small incisions are made in the child's chest to introduce a device with a video camera that allows viewing the area to operate on and the necessary tools to carry out the intervention. The center plans to operate on a dozen patients each year using robotic surgery and about 20 annually using thoracoscopic surgery.