Hello I was wondering if anyone here have had a baby born with a hear murmur and diagnosed with ASD or PDA.
I was told that it is pretty common in babies and a lot of times goes away in a couple of months.
I was wondering if anyone here had to deal with this and if in fact it did correct itself in a few months...
I don't have any experience with this issue, but I have a friend who used to run the Mended Little Hearts support group at Northwest Community Hospital. If you Google it (or call NCH), maybe you call the leader talk to someone who's been through the same thing (or even attend a meeting). Hope this helps...
My husband has a PFO, which is like the little sister to an ASD. Basically, when the baby is in utero, the blood flow inside the heart's chambers is different than after the baby is born. When the baby is in utero, oxygen comes through the umbilical cord. When the baby starts to breathe on its own, the blood gets its oxygen from the lungs, blood flow changes, and the pressure in the different chambers of the heart changes. The atrial septum does not start out as a solid wall. It starts as two pieces, one growning down from the top, and one growing up from the bottom. They are open in utero but when the blood flow and pressures change after birth, the two "flaps" are pressed together and "usually" fuse over the course of the first year of life. This is why many babies have murmurs, and why they usually go away. IF the two flaps aren't big enough to meet and fuse in the middle, the resulting hole is an ASD (atrial septal defect.) If the two flaps are big enough to meet, but for some reason don't fuse, so there is the potential for an opening, or an opening during only part of the heart beat cycle, this is a PFO (patent foramen ovale.) Basically, keep an eye on it. If the hole is so big that your baby isn't getting enough oxygen, they will want to fix it right away (failure to thrive situation.) If the hole is small, it may close on its own. If it doesn't close, you will want to have it closed surgically. Almost all of the time, this is done by doing a vein cut down in the thigh and threading a device (Amplatzer makes one, but there are several different kinds) through a catheter up into the heart, positioning the device over the hole, and deploying it into place. This is one of the most common pediatric cardiac surgeries, all the major childrens hospitals will have someone who has performed many of these procedures. Tissue grows over the device and it becomes buried within the heart wall over a relatively short time. Open heart surgery would only be considered if there were some unusual extenuating circumstance (multiple defects, size of defect, location of hole making placement of closure device extremely difficult.) I think if you had this procedure your child would be kept for overnight observation and sent home the next day. My husband has not had his repaired, but only because the protocol for PFOs is somewhat different than for ASDs. Since his opening is only open part of the time, and autopsy studies have shown that approximately 25% of the population has an undiagnosed PFO that did not interfere with a normal life, he takes an aspirin a day (prevent clots -- heart openings put you at a higher risk of stroke) and sees a cardiologist yearly for a checkup. If the asd/pfo is not repaired, a cardiologist can make sure that the heart is not working too hard in one area to compensate. If the heart muscle starts to enlarge in an asymmetrical fashion that would indicate that the opening was interfering with heart function. Well...this should get you started on your research! Best of luck.
My son has a murmur that was detected at birth - we saw the cardiologist at 3 months and 6 months and they could still detect it. At 3.5, it's still there - but because he doesn't get easily winded or clammy when he's active, the doctor is now considering it to be an "innocent murmur" and he'll probably always have it. The doc isn't concerned and we don't need to take him back unless WE are concerned, or if he starts fainting when he's exerting himself.
My son was diagnosed with it in the NICU as a preemie and it was gone within a week or two.
I remember the pediatrician saying the same thing about my oldest daughter--it did go away, nothing ever came of it!
Just wanted to clarify that by ASD you mean Atrial Septal Defect, a hole in the heart between the right and left artia. Right? Not to be confused with the other ASD -- Autism Spectrum Disorder. I am doubting that your newborn has been diagnosed with anything like that.
I have not gone through that situation myself, but I worked as an OB nurse and saw/heard many heart murmurs. Some will come and go very quickly, can often appear as that ductus arterious is working on closing. Murmurs are quite common and many will correct on their own, as you have been told. Have they told you any signs to look for or things to be aware of? Pale or clammy skin, bluish around the mouth, things like that? Get done any necessary tests, then trust your doctors. Try not to let any worry override the joy of a newborn. Best of luck to you and your baby!
My husband was born with a heart murmur... still has it.... He is perfectly healthy. He played HS & College football... the only thing is that we was not able to join the Air Force... which I'm really happy bc else I wouldn't had met him... God bless you!
My son had an ASD - he is now 23 and it was diagnosed when he was 9 mos. old. We had an echo cardiagram done when he was 11 mos old - they chose not to repair the asd and thought it would fix itself (the flap that was supposed to cover the hole was there - it just closed up part of the time).
It did not fix itself and he had open heart surgery to repair it at 18 mos. Now I hear they can do the same procedure through a closed heart operation.
He is fine and can do all activities.
I am not really sure what ASD is-though I did google it-or PDA (much harder to understand). But my daughter did have a murmur when she was born. The nurse that stayed with us for a few hours after birth found it even though the others did not notice it. She had a heart monitor for a day, ultrasound etc. It turned out her 4th chamber did not close but everyone assured me it was fine and should close over time. Of course as a mom how do you not worry? We had an ECHO done last fall and it is closed. She is 3 1/2 and the doc did hear a slight murmur at 2 yr checkup. It closed somewhere in a 6 month time frame I guess.
My daughter had a couple holes in her heart - a large ASD and a small VSD. She also had a major heart defect called TAPVR, which simply put meant that her heart was plumbed wrong in a couple places. Instead of oxygenated blood going out to her body like normal, it was in a loop going back incorrectly. It was actually the ASD that saved her life because it allowed the mixing of oxygenated blood to leak over into the the other part of her heart (where it should have been going) and that's how she was able to get oxygenated blood out to her body.
That's too much detail. Anyway, she had to have open heart surgery to repair the TAPVR. They repaired the ASD because it was so large. But her VSD was smaller, and they didn't repair it. They left it, assuming it would close on it's own.
It's very common for babies to have what your baby has. It's incredibly common for it to go away. Even in my daughter's case with the VSD, they assumed it would go away. So while they were in there doing open heart surgery, they left it...and it did go away over time.
It's never fun to hear something may be wrong with your baby and that they might have to go through something scary to get it fixed! I hope it's a little bit comforting to know that it will very likely go away. I pray that it does for you guys!
I was told my son had a hole in his heart at birth but that it would most likely correct itself. They checked him a couple days later and he was totally fine. Good luck!!
My son was born with a VSD - which is a hole in the ventricular wall. His was pretty big and did not close - he had surgery when he was 1 and is now a healthy 7 year old.
My daughter had PDA and hers went away without any correction. If your doctor/cardiologist says it will go away, most likely it will. Since I read up plenty on this, I was surprised to find out that a heart defect is the most common birth defect - more than down's syndrome etc. It is natural to worry, but doctors have seen plenty of this and usually know what they are talking about!! Good wishes for you and the baby!! hang in there!
My son had this. It was gone by the age of two.
My daughter also had a heart murmur they heard in the nursery after delivery. We had our first trip to Children's when she was as few weeks old for an echo and ultrasound of her heart. She has ASD and PS. Her ASD was very large and didn't close on it's own. Her Cardiologist said if it didn't close by 6 months of age, it wasn't going to. He was right. She is 26 months now and still has it. It was not bad enough that she needed open heart surgery, but within the next 12 months they are going to close the hole in her heart and fix her pulmonary valve from her PS. He is going to do all of this through a catheter in her groin.
Her first year of life was hard, she had a very hard time gaining any weight due to her two defects. I was told it was common. You would never know by looking at her right now that she has two heart defects.
