Meet a Teenage Heart Warrior
Coimbatore, India
At 14, the once active girl who loved to dance and play developed a fever, and her parents knew something was wrong.
Diagnosed with Ebstein anomaly, a type of congenital heart disease (CHD) requiring surgery, her family faced fear and helplessness until they were referred to G. Kuppuswamy Naidu Memorial (GKNM) Hospital, a Children’s HeartLink hospital partner in Coimbatore, India.
Her heart surgery was a success, and today, she’s back to school, dancing, and spending time with friends.
You can help more children like her get the care they need to survive and thrive. Donate today to support training partnerships that transform heart care around the world.
“Getting the opportunity to work with the superheroes of congenital heart surgery in the best of the world and come back and reproduce the same result with the limited resources. It makes me feel very happy. I made impact on somebody’s else life.”
—Dr. Raju Vijayakumar, cardiac surgeon at G. Kuppuswamy Naidu Memorial Hospital in Coimbatore, India
Pictured from left: Dr. Joseph Dearani, cardiac surgery chair at Mayo Clinic and Children’s HeartLink medical volunteer; teenage heart warrior; Dr. Vijayakumar; heart warrior’s father
In low-resource environments around the world, delay in diagnosis, poor affordability and lack of expertise can all lead to preventable deaths.
Children’s HeartLink partnerships aim to support hospitals on the ground in upskilling their teams to create a multidisciplinary team to treat children born with CHD. Together, we are working toward a world where all children—no matter where they live—have access to high-quality heart care.
You can play a role in this transformative partnership—and others in Bangladesh, Brazil, China, India, Malaysia and Vietnam–by giving to support Children’s HeartLink training partnerships.
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