Open-heart surgery at just 9 days old: a little miraculous return home for the Holidays

When she was only 9 days old, little Lara Blanchette had to undergo open heart surgery to correct a congenital malformation. The baby, a few weeks old, was able to come home just in time to celebrate the first holiday season with his family.

Little Lara was born on October 22 at the CHUL in Quebec, surrounded by specialists ready to take care of her as soon as she showed up. At 20 weeks of pregnancy, a morphological ultrasound detected an anomaly in the little girl's heart.

This is a malformation characterized by the transposition of the great vessels. At birth, this causes a problem with the oxygenation of the blood circulating in the body.

The news shook the couple, but the mother, Léonny Larouche, still spent the remainder of her pregnancy in peace.

“The neonatal team was going to be there at the birth and I'm epileptic, so I already had a pregnancy considered high risk, so I was checked. I was induced at 39 weeks. It went well,” said the mother.

But as soon as little Lara arrived, the team had to get busy.

“They put her on me for a minute and then she was gone [pour être soignée]», continues Léonny.

Her partner, Mathieu Blanchette, did not believe it was possible to do this type of surgery on a baby who is not even 10 days old.

“I told myself it must be medicine [qu’il lui donnerait]. I couldn’t believe they could open a newborn baby’s heart,” he says.

A stay in the USIP

Lara therefore underwent what is called in medical jargon a “switch” or “Jatene”. The procedure basically involves cutting and reconnecting the coronary arteries in the right places so that the heart muscle receives oxygenated blood.

The little family then spent a little less than a week in the new Pediatric Intensive Care Unit (PICU) at the Soleil Mother-Child Center (CMES). An experience that made this moment a little more difficult to get through.

“We had more positives than negatives, but there were days that… meh, we wanted to be at home,” says the father.

Lara and her family were also able to count on the help and psychological support of the Fondation En Cœur during their stay in the hospital, so much so that the father is considering the possibility of volunteering in turn.

“They came the same day of the birth, they were really respectful of our bubble, they always made sure if it was correct before coming,” explains Léonny.

Lara should live well without too many physical limitations. She is not expected to need another operation, but will have regular follow-ups to make sure she is doing well.

Transposition of the great vessels

Congenital heart malformation characterized by an anomaly of the vessels at the base of the heart where, unlike a normal heart, the aorta arises from the right ventricle and the pulmonary artery from the left ventricle.