15-Yr-Old With Congenital Disease 1st in Mumbai to Get Latest Heart Valve

A 15-year-old Mumbai boy with a congenital heart defect is the city's first to receive the Harmony Transcatheter Pulmonary Valve—a cutting-edge valve-replacement procedure, where an expandable valve was delivered through a catheter via the groin.

- Rupsa Chakraborty

MUMBAI:

Performed at the HN Reliance Foundation Hospital, the minimally invasive procedure avoided open-heart surgery by using a catheter to place the valve in the heart, restoring normal blood flow, and enabling rapid recovery.

The boy had undergone corrective heart surgery as a newborn to relieve an obstruction in the right ventricular outflow tract (RVOT), the region of the heart where blood exits the right ventricle and flows into the pulmonary arteries.

While the defect was addressed, doctors had to leave the pulmonary valve non-functional, resulting in chronic pulmonary regurgitation.

Over time, this caused the right ventricle to enlarge and pump inefficiently.

Recently, the boy began experiencing fatigue and reduced exercise tolerance—symptoms of worsening valve insufficiency and heart dilation—prompting the need for valve replacement.