Almost 1300 children had heart surgeries in 2011 in Kazakhstan

Almost 1300 children underwent cardiac surgeries in 2011 in Kazakhstan. However 2500 children a year need the cardiac surgeries for their congenital heart disorder, Tengrinews.kz reports, citing Makhabbat Bekbossynova, deputy chairman of JSC National Scientific Cardiac Surgery Center who said this during a press-conference on February 17. “100-150 surgeries were made on children with congenital heart disorder four and three years ago. We are now able to make 1300 cardiac surgeries every year with the National Scientific Cardiac Surgery Center opened last year. However 2500 children a year require such surgeries. We have being developed children's cardiac service and will keep developing it in future so that less children will have to travel abroad for surgeries,” she said. “About 2800 children with congenital heart disorder are born annually and 1100 among them require surgeries when they are still under 12 months old. If these children don't get the surgeries only 10% of them would to become 1 year old and the other would 90% die. Our main goal is to provide the surgeries for children who are under 12 months old. 40% of children that we make the surgeries on are under 12 months old and 12% are newborn babies,” Dmitry Gorbunov, head of children's cardiac surgery department explained. Newborn children with congenital heart disorder often require emergency surgeries, so as newborns with gastrointestinal tract and nervous system deficiencies. At present nine centers - three national and six regional - offer medical services to children with congenital heart disorder in Kazakhstan.