Dr. J. Romington MBBS DDVL

“For I am the Lord, who heals” - Exodus 15:26

My dear readers! I have encrypted the aforesaid verse in all my 4 clinics in Chennai. It is obvious that many patients of different faith are attracted by this Biblical quote day after day. Have you ever thought why I should keep this verse? What made me to choose this one in particular? What had happened to me? If you all ask me this question, I am afraid I have to take you all a year backwards.

It is my son’s miraculous birth!! A true testimony which is medically proven!! Come! Let us go back a year.

Yes, my dear readers! The Lord said to Ezekiel in 36:26, “I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you; I will take the heart of stone out of your flesh and give you a heart of flesh”,which was true in our life too! As we where getting ready for my wife’s second delivery, we never thought a shock was waiting to greet us. Her expected date was the 25th July 2009 and on the 10th July, as she went for a scan, a bombshell exploded!

My son had a heart disease! Subjecting the unborn child to repeated specialist scans at Madipakkam, Nungambakkam and the Apollo Heart Centre in Chennai, it was confirmed that the baby certainly had a heart disease. Finally a name (diagnosis) was put to this disease called as TAPVC, which means Total Anomalous Pulmonary Venous Communication.

In lay man’s term the blood vessel which should be carrying pure blood from lungs to the left side of the heart was joining on the right side. This would upset the whole working dynamo-mechanics of the heart. In fact there was only a very thin left side upper chamber in the heart, as if it is non existent. This would mean the heart has only 3 functioning chambers not 4, causing a major upset and disruption to its function.

The incidence of heart disease in a new born child is 1 in 1000 children (0.1%), while this TAPVC happens only in 1 in 100,000 (0.0001%), which will tell you how rare this condition would be. This is not unlike having a hole in the heart, which is easy to treat and people can easily live up to 50 years or more, sometimes even without surgery. However for TAPVC, surgery becomes vital, either soon after birth or within 6 months. This condition has the following abnormalities in the heart.

1) Partial or complete absence or abnormal drainage of all the 4 pulmonary veins, which are blood vessels carrying pure blood from lungs to heart
2) The right side upper(atrium) and the lower(ventricle) chambers of the heart are enlarged 
3) There can be holes in the walls separating the heart chambers
4) The valves of the heart can be affected
5) The lungs are affected and swollen, leading to breathing difficulties
6) Heart failure can happen

Now top four of the aforesaid findings were diagnosed in our child before birth and the bottom two will be known precisely only at birth. We do have the scan films and reports of this and any “Thomas’s” could be provided same for confirmation.