{"id":260080,"date":"2022-01-03T08:43:19","date_gmt":"2022-01-03T14:43:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.liveaction.org\/news\/?p=260080"},"modified":"2021-12-31T14:02:50","modified_gmt":"2021-12-31T20:02:50","slug":"doctors-save-baby-smallest-mechanical-heart-valve","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/doctors-save-baby-smallest-mechanical-heart-valve\/","title":{"rendered":"Doctors save baby’s life with mechanical heart valve the size of a dime"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/div>

A little Connecticut boy is thriving after receiving the world’s smallest mechanical heart valve. Baby Ellis\u00a0Schwartz-Mosca received the valve when he was just two\u00a0months old, and weighed only 7 pounds 9 ounces \u2014 a size that was previously unheard of.<\/p>\n

According to a press release<\/a> from Connecticut Children’s Medical Center, doctors discovered that baby Ellis had aortic stenosis<\/a> when his mom Alyse was 20 weeks pregnant. The condition meant that the left side of Ellis’s heart was too small. According to the doctors, Ellis would need immediate medical treatment after birth in order to survive.<\/p>\n

After Ellis was born, doctors inserted a cardiac catheter when he was just three days old, and they later performed open-heart surgery when he was six weeks old. Unfortunately, though, the open-heart surgery wasn’t able to fix all of Ellis’s heart problems. His heart valve still wasn’t functioning on its own. Ellis wasn’t gaining weight, and he still needed a ventilator to breathe.<\/p>\n

In order to fix the problem, Ellis’s doctors decided to do something unprecedented \u2014 to\u00a0replace the heart valve with a mechanical one that measured about the size of a dime. Doctors say that up until a few years ago, this tiny mechanical valve didn’t even exist. Ellis received the valve during a second open-heart surgery when he was two months old.<\/p>\n

READ:\u00a0In the ER with heart failure, this cancer survivor learned she was pregnant with twins<\/a><\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

According to the press release, “When Ellis is a toddler, and likely again when he\u2019s a teenager, Connecticut Children\u2019s cardiac surgeons will need to swap out his mechanical valve for bigger versions. Even when he\u2019s an adult, he\u2019ll continue to receive specialized heart care from Connecticut Children\u2019s through our nationally-accredited Adult Congenital Heart Disease program<\/a>, the only one in the state of Connecticut.”<\/p>\n

\u201cI can\u2019t imagine not having good people to go through this with,\u201d says Alyse. \u201cWe\u2019re so grateful that, just 20 minutes away, we have the greatest children\u2019s hospital.\u201d<\/p>\n

Now, four months later, Ellis is thriving. \u201cHe\u2019s doing amazing. He\u2019s chatty all the time,\u201d says Alyse. \u201cWe found out very quickly that he\u2019s in charge.\u201d<\/p>\n

The willingness of Ellis’s parents and his doctors to do everything possible to save him shows the importance of giving each child a chance at life.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m grateful that something exists for someone so small,\u201d says mom Alyse. \u201cI\u2019m so grateful that it was even a possibility.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cLike\u201d Live Action News on Facebook<\/a>\u00a0for more pro-life news and commentary!<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A little Connecticut boy is thriving after receiving the world’s smallest mechanical heart valve. Baby Ellis\u00a0Schwartz-Mosca received the valve when he was just two\u00a0months old, and weighed only 7 pounds 9 ounces \u2014 a size that was previously unheard of. According to a press release from Connecticut Children’s Medical Center, doctors discovered that baby Ellis […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":607,"featured_media":191950,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false},"categories":[9455,3473],"tags":[14991,14992,14993,12044],"yoast_head":"\nDoctors save baby's life with mechanical heart valve the size of a dime<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"A little Connecticut boy is thriving after receiving the world's smallest mechanical heart valve at just two\u00a0months old, and weighing only 7 pounds 9 ounces\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/doctors-save-baby-smallest-mechanical-heart-valve\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta 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