BRAMA, Apr 10, 2004, 1:00 pm ET
Press Release
First National Ukrainian Forum on Diagnosing and Treating Infants with Congenital Heart Disease
© Children of Chornobyl Relief Fund
The opening of the Infant Cardiac Defects Forum, in Kyiv, Ukraine.
Pictured from left to right: Dr. Zenon Matkiwsky, CCRF Founder and
President; US Ambassador to Ukraine, John E. Herbst; and Dr. Robert
Shaddy, Pediatric Cardiologist and forum guest lecturer from Salt
Lake City, Utah.
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On April 1-2 400 Ukrainian doctors and 100 Ukrianian nurses participated in the National Ukrainian Forum "International and Nationwide Experience in Treating Infants with Congenital Heart Disease" at the Kyiv City WWII Veterans' Hospital in Puscha Vodytsia. This was the first full-scale conference in Ukraine to address the pressing need to improve the early diagnosis of congenital heart disease in newborns and the surgical intervention necessary to correct cardiac defects. The forum was organized by the Children of Chornobyl Relief Fund (CCRF) and was sanctioned by Ukraine's Ministry of Health, the Scientific-Practical Medical Center of Children's Cardiology and Cardiac Surgery at the Amosov Institute and the Association of Neonatologists of Ukraine.
The Children of Chornobyl Relief Fund has been combating the issue of decreasing infant mortality in Ukraine since 1995. In conjunction with the Fund's mission to save the lives of Ukrainian children, all of whom confront the legacy of the Chornobyl catastrophe and other environmental problems, CCRF organized the forum to provide Ukrainian doctors with the opportunity to learn about prenatal and neonatal diagnosis of congenital heart disease in newborns. Forum lecturers included two US guest lecturers from the United States and Ukrainian specialists from various medical fields related to cardiac surgery and neonatology. Four hundred doctors from every region of Ukraine participated. Oblast neonatologists, oblast pediatricians, oblast obstetricians, oblast anesthesiologists, pediatric cardiologists and from oblast children's hospitals and maternity hospitals: ultrasound specialists, neonatologists, and neonatal intensive care nurses. Sponsors of the conference were invited to display their diagnostic equipment, infant formula, and surgical supplies. CCRF distributed 2,000 copies of the translated book "Cardiovascular Disease in the Neonate" from the series "Clinics in Perinatology" (W.B. Sunders Company) as well as three other Ukrainian-language books related to the subject.
Participants in the official opening and press conference included:
The United States Ambassador John. E. Herbst
The President and Founder of the Children of Chornobyl Relief Fund - Dr. Zenon Matkiwsky
The Director of The Scientific-Practical Medical Center of Children's Cardiology and Cardiac Surgery at the Amosov Institute- Dr. Illya M. Yemets
The Medical Director of the Heart Transplant Program at the Primary Children's Center in Salt Lake City, Utah; the forum's US guest lecturer - Dr. Robert Shaddy
The Head of the Department of Medical Assistance to Mothers and Children at the Ministry of Health of Ukraine - Dr. Raissa O. Moiseenko
Each year, between 6,000-6,500 children with congenital heart disease are born in Ukraine. Accomplishments in modern pediatric cardiac surgery have made it possible to ensure these patients with long and healthy lives, and to save up to 95% of those who receive surgical operations during the early stages of their disease. But in Ukraine, these statistics don't ring true. Of the infants born with congenital heart defects who do not have access to needed surgery, 30% die within the first year of life, of them - 50% die within their first month of life. Therefore, between 1,500- 1,800 children younger than 12 months old, of which 750-900 are newborns, die each year because they are not operated on in time. Only 186 heart surgeries were performed on newborns in Ukraine, while in 1995 in France, whose population can be compared to that of Ukraine, 1,772 heart surgeries were performed on newborns.
The national Ukrainian Forum "International and Nationwide Experience in Treating Infants with Congenital Heart Defects" organized by the Children of Chornobyl Relief Fund addressed the pressing need to improve the early diagnosis of congenital heart disease in newborns and the surgical intervention necessary to correct the defects.
For more information, please contact
Children of Chornobyl Relief Fund
Tel: 228-1870, 494-1535
www.childrenofchornobyl.org
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