For example, children with single ventricle are more at risk than those with a simple septal defect. Fine and Gross Motor function may be just a little bit impaired. Many of them will have Down Syndrome. This, of course, complicates the assessment. Perhaps I should explain a bit more about the interaction between the brain and heart disease.
Some children also have congenital structural abnormalities of the brain.
There are significant advances being made in protecting the brain during and after surgery. The outlook for children born with congenital heart disease now is significantly better than 5-10 years ago, both in terms of their survival and their quality of life. To my knowledge, there are no associated neurologic or developmental problems typically associated with this type of surgery. However, some children with Supravalvular Aortic Stenosis may have associated conditions like Williams syndrome, which may be associated with learning problems. The problem with the assessment of hearing is that multiple medicines have been related to hearing loss, especially those given in the CICU like certain antibiotics, etc.