For more than a decade, The Heart Institute for Children, headquartered at Advocate Hope Children’s Hospital, has been a regional center of excellence in the care of children with heart disease. It is the largest pediatric cardiac surgical program in Illinois, and has gained national and international stature in the field of pediatric cardiology. The medical staff is widely recognized, not only for its expertise in pediatric cardiology, but also for its highly specialized diversification in the areas of critical care, hemodynamics, interventional cardiac catheterization, cardiac electrophysiology and noninvasive cardiac imaging (fetal/transesophageal echocardiography, nuclear cardiology, magnetic resonance imaging and ultra-fast cine CT).

Surgical expertise includes neonatal cardiac surgery, complex cardiac surgery, cardiac or heart/lung transplantation, reconstructive surgery for congenital tracheal abnormalities and experimental fetal cardiac surgery.

The activities at The Heart Institute for Children are complimented by those of pediatric subspecialists at Hope Children’s Hospital, who provide a complete range of services throughout the continuum of care. Surgical patients and their families benefit from The Heart Institute for Children’s Surgical Heart Unit, its suite of private rooms, state-of-the-art monitoring systems and equipment and a nursing staff dedicated exclusively to the care of pediatric cardiac patients. Medical services at The Heart Institute for Children include:

• Management of congenital heart disease, including cardiac catheterization for newborns and children less than one year old.
• Treatment for childhood-acquired cardiovascular diseases, including myocarditis, Kawasaki’s disease, rheumatic heart disease and other connective tissue disorders.
• Management of congenital and acquired heart disease in the fetus, including on-site cardiology support during delivery and genetic counseling.
• Treatment for persistently hypoxemic babies or children not responding to full ventilatory support, including nitric oxide treatment — a state-of-the-art therapeutic modality to correct pulmonary hypertension in children with severe respiratory failure, as well as meconium aspiration and persistent pulmonary hypertension in newborns — and extracorporeal membrane oxygenation (ECMO) for temporary heart-lung support.

The Heart Institute for Children offers complete diagnostic and surgical capabilities, using the most sophisticated technology available. Routine diagnostic procedures, such as EKG and chemistries, are provided at outpatient clinics. Additional tests and procedures available at Hope Children’s Hospital include:

• Echocardiography, including routine transthoracic echocardiography, transesophageal echocardiography (TEE), fetal echocardiography, dobutamine stress echocardiography, echo-guided balloon atrial septostomy and echo-guided pericardiocentesis.
• Exercise stress testing, including routine treadmill stress tests (using pediatric or Bruce protocols) and stress with myocardial perfusion imaging.
• Evaluations of presyncope/syncope (for neurocardiogenic syncope), including tilt test with or without Isuprel infusion, and Holter EKG or cardiac event recorder, if necessary.
• Cardiac electrophysiologic procedures (for arrhythmia), including transesophageal electrophysiologic study, intracardiac electrophysiologic study, pacemaker surveillance and programming, radiofrequency catheter ablation of arrhythmia-inducing tissues for the treatment of supraventricular/ventricular arrhythmias and transvenous cardiac pacemaker implantation.
• Cardiac catheterization procedures, conducted in a state-of-the-art biplane “cine-less” cardiac catheterization lab to reduce radiation exposure for the patient and physician, include routine right/left heart diagnostic procedures, and special or interventional procedures, such as valvulotomy for pulmonary or aortic stenosis, stents to correct stenotic vessels, coil embolization of ductus arteriosus or AV fistulae, balloon or blade atrial septostomy and closure of atrial septal defect.

The Heart Institute for Children presently performs 90 radiofrequency catheter ablations in children each year, with a cure rate of nearly 95 percent and no mortality, results that exceed those of other pediatric medical centers that participate in a national registry for pediatric ablations. The Heart Institute for Children also performs 20 transvenous cardiac pacemakers and 10 intracardiac defibrillators each year for life-threatening arrhythmias in children.

For all procedures or surgeries at The Heart Institute for Children, the referring physician plays a key role on the treatment team, as a resource for patient case history and as a participant in ongoing communication throughout treatment and follow-up care.

Along with providing superior cardiac care, The Heart Institute for Children is a national center for research and development, pioneering advances in cardiac echo imaging, including the transtelephonic transfer of echocardiograms from satellite sites and three-dimensional imaging during multi-plane transesophageal echocardiography.

The Heart Institute for Children’s medical staff, including a world-renowned congenital cardiac pathologist and an expert in cardiac molecular biology, conducts clinical and basic science research on an ongoing basis.

The Heart Institute for Children supports the outreach philosophy of Hope Children’s Hospital through its Community Heart Institute Program, a network of services at 38 community hospitals and 23 off-site clinics throughout northern Illinois and Indiana.