Following the Heart

The Aurora Sentinel
February 13, 2008
By: Boyd Fletcher

A Feb. 13 story in The Aurora Sentinel profiled a University of Colorado Hospital program that is aimed specifically at adults who are living with pediatric-onset congenital heart disease.

Dr. Dunbar Ivy, chief and chairman of pediatric cardiology at Children's Hospital Colorado, helped recruit Dr. Joseph Kay for the program. He said the need for such specialized doctors is growing, and that because of increased survival rates, there currently are more adults living with a childhood congenital heart disease than children living with it in this country.

"Very few people have that cross-experience," he said. "And we realized there are adults that didn't want to come to Children's anymore. They wanted to be seen in an adult program."

Roughly one in every 120 babies is born with a heart defect, and roughly 800,000 children are currently living with some form of congenital heart disease in the United States, according to the Adult Congenital Heart Association.

With improved surgery techniques and better follow-up, the number of children who live into adulthood increases by approximately 5 percent each year, according to the ACHA.

Read the article