Congenital Heart Disease Treatment

At the comprehensive Edmond J. Safra International Congenital Heart Center at Sheba Medical Center in Israel, we provide every resource that a heart patient needs. Our world-class cardiothoracic surgeons perform approximately 400 surgeries and 300 catheterization procedures per year, and our highly trained, compassionate specialists offer treatment for more than 150 congenital heart defects.

While it is impossible to always predict when congenital heart disease will occur, there are factors that raise the risk for certain pregnant women. Women with these risk factors are recommended to undergo a fetal echocardiogram to inspect the health of the fetus.

The most common risk factors include:

• Family history
• Genetic or chromosomal problems in the fetus, such as Down syndrome
• Diabetes on the mother’s side
• Prenatal exposure to specific medications
• Drug or alcohol abuse during pregnancy
• First-trimester exposure to German measles (rubella)

The symptoms of congenital heart disease vary depending upon age.

In newborns, the signs can include:

• Rapid breathing
• Deep rib retraction during breathing
• Bluish tint in the skin, lips, and fingernails (cyanosis)
• Fatigue
• Poor feeding
• Lung infections
• Poor weight gain

In older children, the signs of a congenital heart defect can include:

• Fatigue
• Low tolerance for exercise
• Rapid or labored breathing either at rest or with exercise
• Swollen feet, ankles, and legs
• Loss of consciousness
• Loss of appetite
• Unexplained chronic stomachache

At Sheba, our medical team is dedicated to treating patients with congenital heart disease so they experience maximum comfort and minimal pain. We treat a wide variety of congenital heart defects and perform many advanced and complex surgical interventions, sometimes in combination with cardiac catheterization. At our state-of-the-art Congenital Heart Center, pediatric surgeons can perform surgeries for heart disease on low weight newborns (less than 2.5 kg).

In addition, Sheba doctors have developed a minimally invasive, unique method to treat particular types of congenital heart defects. Using this technique, our surgeon performs the operation through a cosmetic incision beneath the breast, so scarring is not visible in the future.