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Symptoms that may indicate heart disease in children
By learning about and understanding congenital heart disease in children, it is hoped that parents and adults can better prepare for the challenges and difficulties in the coming years.
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When your child has heart disease, it could mean that they were born with a defect in the structure of the heart. (Shutterstock/udra11)
Contrary to popular belief, the signs and symptoms of heart disease can start appearing at an early age.
When your child has heart disease, it could mean that they were born with a defect in the structure of the heart. While some defects don’t need treatment, others may be more complex and require surgery to be performed over the course of several years, reports kompas.com.
By learning about and understanding congenital heart disease in children, it is hoped that parents and adults can better prepare for the challenges and difficulties in the coming years, as even though the disease is congenital, it may only affect the victim as they grew older.
“Congenital heart disease means that the defect has been there ever since birth. It's just that, as you get older, it gets more serious. Generally, the signs appear more obviously in older ages,” says heart and vascular specialist doctor Vito Damay from Siloam Hospital Lippo Village Heart Center as quoted by kompas.com. “Symptoms can only be visible from an early age only if the defect is fatal."
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When detecting signs of congenital heart disease in babies, Vito suggests paying detailed attention to physical differences. For instance, an affected baby will get tired easily and have a tighter chest. Therefore, when they breastfeed, they will slowly stop trying to suckle the milk.
Additionally, the baby will sweat more easily and have a hard time breathing as the body continues to adapt to the conditions.
On the other hand, Vito advises parents to observe strange habits when it comes to detecting the signs of heart defects in children. For example, if the child's lips turn blue or the child would prefer to squat when doing activities. Moreover, they may seem to get easily tired when exercising. This can easily be mistaken for laziness when it is in actuality due to the tight chest. (saz/kes)
