The gestational age at birth in Australia has slowly but steadily declined over the past 30 years, mainly due to increase in planned births (caesarian sections, inductions of labor). The effects of this decline in gestational age to child health are evident at many levels – intensive care, paediatric care, community, and school.
Synopsis The Royal Children’s Hospital welcomes patients from all over our beautiful country for cardiac treatment, but we also acknowledge that this can be a frightening time for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children and their families that can bring up feelings of fear, sadness, homesickness, and isolation. Many of our Aboriginal and Torres Strait … Continued
We are all problem solvers. We are accustomed to applying the scientific method and quality improvement models to deliver better care. Design thinking is an approach to solving problems that emphasizes a human-centred and iterative process to create innovative solutions. Six years ago, we invited design students into the PICU to see if we could find better ways of teaching congenital heart disease. This is the story of that journey.
Over recent years the number of children with advanced heart failure from cardiomyopathy and congenital heart disease receiving treatment has increased considerably. The Royal Children’s Hospital has been the nationally funded centre for heart transplantation in children for 30 years. The RCH heart failure program involves medical, surgical, nursing, allied health and biomedical technology. Successful management of severe heart disease in children requires a detailed understanding of the aetiology, likely disease trajectory and balancing an increasing number of treatment options.
The relevance of regularly measuring blood pressure in childhood and adolescence has been a subject of debate. This Grand Round will present the case for routine blood pressure screening in the young, including data on blood pressure tracking from childhood to adulthood, and the association of high blood pressure in childhood with intermediate markers of cardiovascular disease.
Blood-clotting complications are rapidly emerging as a significant part of the pathogenesis of COVID-19. There are reports of otherwise well people with COVID-10 having strokes, pulmonary emboli and heart attacks, and children with inflammation of their blood vessels. In recent weeks series of cases of a multi-system inflammatory condition, some resembling Kawasaki disease, have been reported in children in Europe, UK and USA.
The Australian and New Zealand Fontan Registry has demonstrated that the expectations of survival for children born with the most extreme congenital cardiac conditions are much better than previously thought. The Registry has also shown the burden of complications of the Fontan circulation. We will present you with the avenues to improve the outcomes of this population
The Australia and New Zealand Fontan Registry is the largest database of patients born with a single heart pumping chamber. The Fontan Registry has already allowed us to demonstrate that survival is far better than expected.
Heart disease is the leading cause of death in infants and contributes more than 9,000 Disability Adjusted Life Years (DALYs) to the total burden of disease in Australia.
Tetralogy of Fallot remains the most frequent cyanotic cardiac condition of the newborns. It was described for the first time in 1880 and it may seem surprising that so many questions concerning its optimal management remain unanswered up to this date.
