The Parent's Guide to Children's Congenital Heart Defects: What They Are, How to Treat Them, How to Cope With Them

"The Parent's Guide to Children's Congenital Heart Defects" (CHD) covers everything a parent facing his or her child's CHD will want to know and then some: the Why's, What's, and How's of a range of disorders, symptoms, and treatments associated with CHD -- from the womb and into the world, in the hospital, home, school, playground, all the way to adulthood. No more will parents have to wade through medical textbooks to find answers to their questions, and questions they didn't know to ask. The authors, each with a child who survived CHD, worked in direct collaboration with the top experts in the field to translate the most up-to-date knowledge about CHD into plain, empathetic English. They add a chorus of other parents' CHD stories for moral support and homespun advice. Chapters include: Diagnosis: symptoms, tests, causes, and developmentCoping: Sharing the news, informing your child, finding support, and living with CHDDay to Day: Eating and nutrition, childhood illnesses, medications,and other everyday concernsSurgery: blood donations, heart valves, the OR, catheterization, and surgical proceduresThe Hospital: overview, the ICU, and recoveryLife After Surgery: activity, scars, complications, follow-up, having more childrenGrowing Up: approaching adulthood, sex and reproduction, psycho-social aspects, finding information, mutual support, and communityResources: extensive list of online and bricks and mortar sources of information, help, and supportBibliographyand a heartfelt foreword by Sylvester Stallone and Jennifer Flavin-Stallone.