Constancio Medrano, president of the Secpcc; and, Alberto Mendoza, head of the Pediatric Heart Institute of 12 October.
“The National system of health (SNS) needs more funding to address the pediatric congenital heart disease“. These are the statements of Constancio Medrano Lopezpresident of the Spanish Society of Pediatric Cardiology and Congenital Heart Diseases (Secpcc), who establishes five key points that still need to be improved in our country to treat this type of pathology. According to Medrano López, “the most necessary and primordial thing is create infrastructure that belong to one cardiovascular research network in Pediatricsrecognized by the Carlos III Health Institute and that they all have specific prioritization lines”.
To this need, Medrano López adds that, in terms of staff and the time they dedicate to studying the pediatric congenital heart disease, “it is really essential that there be more research staff and, of course, more funding for these people, in addition to investing in studies or trials that they can carry out.” A requirement that goes hand in hand with intensifications. For Medrano López, “the time dedicated to research should be extended through policies to intensify personnel, converting that duration into part-time contracts for other people.”
A point of view that supports Albert Mendozahead of the Pediatric Heart Institute of the Hospital October 12for whom, today, “there are very few groups dedicated to researching the pediatric congenital heart diseasesince most of them are dedicated to patient care”. A “personnel gap” found in Spanish health and that “should be expanded by at least 20 percent more than the personnel dedicated to the investigation of these pathologies”.
More technology to treat congenital heart disease in children
For Mendoza, in addition to this increase, “there should be an investment to stimulate the public inquirysuch as scholarships, since most research projects are aimed at development of new drugs and are sponsored by pharmaceutical industryleaving aside other types of projects”, such as the approach to congenital heart disease in children.
Regarding the internal situation of the different Spanish hospitals, Mendoza assures that “looking at the rest of the Pediatric Cardiology and Congenital Heart Disease units, I consider that they all lack the same thing: funding for research.” However, he affirms that “in the daily care of the patient, the hospital centers are moderately well endowed, despite the fact that it might be improve and renewas needed in ECO appliances and, above all, in imaging techniques“.
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Constancio Medrano: “I propose a public-private collaboration with the companies that have the best technology” |
Medrano López also stresses that the congenital heart disease in children they need “more technology”. For this, the president of the Secpcc proposes “a public-private collaboration with the private companies that have the best technology, especially in the world of imaging techniques, ultrasounds and hemodynamicsIn this sense, he adds that “these companies should have investment and innovation lines in the pediatric field as a priority and that this be recognized by public entities to promote them”.
And, finally, in relation to research, Medrano López considers it necessary “to have sufficient resources to generate records and have patient data on which studies or trials can be carried out.” Some data that the Secpcc already collects but “is not enough and much more is needed.”
Health care situation of congenital heart disease in children in Spain
At a general level, both in Spain and in the rest of the world, “there are no exact data that more than one in 100 children suffer from congenital heart disease“, assures Medrano López and adds that “not all of them need operations”, since in Spain it is estimated that “one in three needs to be operated on in the first year of life and they are those that are considered complex associated heart diseases, in some cases , to different syndromes, such as Down Syndrome”.
Due to the wide variety of heart diseases that can be found, according to Medrano López, “hospital centers must have expert personnel both from the cardiological point of view (to make the diagnosis and follow-up) and surgical (surgeons, neonatologists, anesthesiologists, etc. are involved)”. A coverage of professionals with which, in this sense, “Spain has around 14 highly specialized centers and two of them belong to the private sector”.
Currently, Spain has “five Centers, Services and Reference Units (IT’S SURE) structured through the Ministry of Health and, in this sense, the public system works very well on equity so that all people have access to these highly specialized centers,” says Medrano López.
Furthermore, the president of the Secpcc establishes as its main objective “to try to reduce the morbidity results of pediatric patients with congenital heart disease until reaching zero percent”. This being one of the main problems faced by these specialists since “many of these patients, when they grow up, have serious sequelae such as neurological ones or even develop multiple pathologies”, he concludes.
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