Vaccinations provide clear advantages to children and vaccinations are generally recommended also to children with congenital or acquired heart disease. The main benefits of vacinations are that the response of the immune system and the symptoms triggered by the vaccination are considerably milder and complications are fewer than those experienced when the real-life infection is…
Despite the decreasing prevalence of smoking in developed world, those most likely to smoke are in their 20-40s, the period that corresponds to parenthood. Several cross sectional studies in children have shown that exposure to passive smoke affects vascular health, including impaired endothelial function, arterial stiffness, and greater intima-media thickness. In a new prospective study…
On-going research at the Centre for Cardiovascular Imaging (UCL Institute of Cardiovascular Science) and at the Cardiothoracic Unit at Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children in London is looking into the potential of using 3-dimensional patient-specific models of congenital heart diseases in clinical practice. Such models, produced with a technique known as “rapid prototyping”, can…
Mitral valve prolapse is a common cardiac condition where the inlet valve to the left sided pumping chamber closes in a different way from normal. In this condition, the valve leaflets (the doors) do not stop tilting at the level of the valve hinges (the valve annulus) but they continue tilting into the left sided…
Congenital cardiac defects occur in around 8 to 10 out of 1000 babies born. Several factors are known to lead to a higher risk of congenital heart disease and this include a previous case of congenital heart disease in the family, consanguinity (when the mother and the father are related to each other), diabetes and…
