Today... February 7th... is the start of National Congenital Heart Defect or CHD Awareness Week!!
So for those who may not know what a CHD is... here are some Facts for you:
-Congenital Heart Defects are the World's Number ONE birth defect and birth defect killer!!
-About 1 in 100 babies will be born with a CHD and 4,000 in the U.S Alone will not see their first birthday
-There are about 1 Million CHD Adults and 800,000 CHD babies/kids in the U.S alone
-There are about 40 CHDs and NO CURE for any of them!... they range for mild to severe
-About 50% of CHDers will need at least ONE invasive surgery in their lifetime!!
-Inpatient surgery for CHDs exceeds 2.2 Billion dollars a year!!
-CHDs Kill more kids than all forms of Childhood Cancer combined!!
-Only 1 penny of every dollar donated to Heart Disease goes to CHD research!
BUT THERE IS HOPE!!
-Over 50% of CHDers are Adults!!
-8 out of 10... or about 85% of CHDers WILL make it to Adulthood!!
-The earlier a CHD is detected the better the outcome "can" be!!
-I'm 1 in 100!!
-I was not diagnosed till 11 weeks old and dying.
-I have one of the severe Congenital Heart Defects.... Tricuspid Atresia, Hypoplastic Right Ventricle or "half a working heart"/single ventricle repair
-My CHD is one of seven that are considered Critical CHDs that 9 out of 10 times can be detected by a simple Pulse Ox... which is a simple non-invasive and cheap test... it is like a bandaid with a red light that tests how much oxygen is in ones blood.
BE AWARE!!
**THREE GREAT LINKS:http://pulseoxadvocacy.com/ ,
Here is my CHD Journey in Montage Form (or you can read my CHD journey here:http://laurensheart.blogspot.com/2009/11/my-chd-journey.html)
