Screening children with congenital heart diseases

The program is scheduled on December 16-17.

The subjects of the program are 0-to-16-year-old children who have the symptoms identified by local doctors as congenital heart diseases; those with frequent coughing, persistent wheezing, and unusual breathing; infants with some indications of slow feeding (lasting more than 30 minutes); and infants who are slow-growing, pale-skinned, cold, sweaty, and easy to get tired; etc.

The program of "Heart for Children" has been launched in October 2008 by the Vietnam Heart Fund of Vietnam Television (VTV) and military-run telecommunications group (Viettel) to support humanitarian heart surgery for all poor Vietnamese children under the age of 16, aiming to bring children the healthy hearts and normal life.

After almost nine years of implementation, the program has successfully supported successful surgery for 4,000 children under 16 years old with congenital heart diseases; and screened more than 50,000 children nationwide.

Story and photos: Minh Van