HYDERABAD: A baby girl, who was diagnosed with a life threatening congenital heart disease in the womb, got a new lease of life as doctors at a city hospital performed a corrective surgery on her two hours after she was born.

Doctors at Care Hospital said the girl was suffering from a rare disorder wherein the oxygen-rich blood returned from the pulmonary veins was abnormally getting diverted to the liver instead of heart.

"A foetus is dependent on mother's blood and hence the baby was normal in the womb. But after birth, babies suffering from this rare malformation, referred as Total Anomalous Pulmonary Venous Return (TAPVR), die without a reconstructive surgery," said Dr K Nageshwar Rao , paediatric cardiologist , Care Hospital, and part of the team that performed the first-of-its-kind surgery.

Doctors said such cases are reported once in one lakh births and generally babies die within a short duration after birth because the blood does not circulate to all the organs. "Earlier, we came across such cases but we operated on those children very late. Children who are operated upon late are prone to future problems but this baby will hav a normal life since she was operated within two hours," said Dr Rao.

"The baby's umbilical cord blood was used for the surgery", added Dr Tapan Dash, paediatric cardiothoracic surgeon.

