Many adults with congenital heart defects have undergone one or more heart operations and still enjoy an excellent quality of life.
To ensure that this remains the case, most of these adults with congenital heart defects ("EMAH") require medical follow-up care throughout their lives. There are currently an estimated 250,000 EMAH patients living in Germany.
Who is responsible? Pediatric cardiology with all its prior knowledge, or adult cardiology and cardiac surgery? The logical answer: all together, and in a structured way with good Communications between them!
At Hannover Medical School, we have created a special cooperative care offer for this, which was examined in detail by the "German Society of Cardiology" (DGK) and the "German Society of Pediatric Cardiology" (DGPK) in July 2014 and officially certified in August 2014. There is an "institutionalized" very close cooperation between cardiology, paediatric cardiology and heart defect surgery at the MHH in our "Certified Supraregional EMAH Centre". We work closely with colleagues in private practice - in particular with the EMAH specialist practices.
Map with certified EMAH centers and practices More information on the transition consultation More information on interdisciplinary patient management
The transition - from child to adult
First of all, a joint handover visit (so-called "transition consultation") takes place in our pediatric cardiac outpatient clinic with Dr. Urte Grosser (Pediatric Cardiology) and PD Dr. Mechthild Westhoff-Bleck from the local Clinical Department of Cardiology and Angiology of Professor Johann Bauersachs. Dr. Westhoff-Bleck provides outpatient care for young adults with congenital heart defects in close cooperation with in-house specialist departments and cardiology practices in the region.
EMAH patients can therefore rest assured that they will benefit from the full expertise of the adult cardiology department. This can be important, for example, for heart failure, heart rhythm problems, pacemaker issues and for the prophylaxis or treatment of acquired heart disease, which anyone can suffer from.
More information on the EMAH outpatient clinic from Dr. Grosser More information on the EMAH outpatient clinic from PD Dr. Westhoff-Bleck
When an intervention becomes necessary - interdisciplinary expertise
Occasionally, surgical or cardiac catheter-based treatment may also be necessary in adulthood in order to cure or improve the heart defect. An interdisciplinary heart conference is held for our EMAH patients to help them make decisions. All important findings are assessed there by many experts from all areas that are important in EMAH medicine: Cardiac surgery, rhythm and pacemaker specialists, experts in cardiac catheter therapy, experienced pediatric cardiologists with access to all pre-treatments from childhood, cardioradiologists with experience in heart defect medicine. Other medical teams can be called in at any time as required: Gynecologists and obstetricians, pulmonary or gastrointestinal specialists, transplant and ventricular assist device experts, intensivists and cardiac anesthesiologists.
Detailed protocols are drawn up for each individual patient, which are directly accessible to all practitioners. This ensures that the best possible treatment recommendation can be proposed and implemented.
If an operation or cardiac catheter intervention is recommended, the entire MHH team of experts in invasive heart defect treatment is available. The treatment then takes place where the paediatric heart defect patients are treated in order to concentrate the vast experience of this highly specialized medicine and thus achieve the best possible results.