THE International Children’s Heart Foundation (ICHF), commonly known as ‘Babyheart Foundation’, has successfully completed cardiac-related procedures on 20 children and two adults at the Georgetown Public Hospital Corporation (GPHC) during its fourth trip recently.Over a two-week period, 16 open heart surgeries and five cardiac catheterisations were performed on patients ranging from one year old to 35 years old.

According to a release from the Ministry of Public Health, “So far, no complications have arisen, and all 22 persons are recovering well from their respective procedures. Those procedures were done by a 22-member team from the Babyheart Foundation, which worked along with 49 local medical professionals.”

The Babyheart Foundation team included a perfusionist, surgeon, cardiologist, nurses, and a respiratory therapist; while the local medical professionals included 35 nurses, a perfusionist and six pediatric residents. (A perfusionist is a specialised healthcare professional who uses the heart-lung machine to manage the patient’s physiological status during cardiac surgery and other surgeries that require cardiopulmonary bypass).

The team arrived in Guyana on February 27, and will depart on March 13, 2016. Its members have, to date, performed 67 cardiac-related procedures on Guyanese. The team is scheduled to make its next trip in June 2016.

In addition to performing cardiac-related procedures, the foundation has also been helping to build the capacity of the GPHC to cater to paediatric cardiac patients.