A team of 24 medical specialists, led by Dr. Prem Venugopal from Queensland Children’s Hospital, Australia, successfully performed heart surgeries on 14 children with Congenital Heart Disease (CHD), including six infants under six months old, in just five days.
The team included experts from various countries, and the surgeries took place at Sai Sanjeevani Children’s Hospital in Nasese, with the support of UK-based charitable organisation Healing Little Hearts.
Dr. Prem said that it was an amazing experience for him and his team adding that the international standard of infrastructure and facilities at the hospital gave hope to children who underwent heart surgeries.
Namrata Tappoo of Sai Prema Foundation Fiji, a charitable organisation that built and operates the Sai Sanjeevani Children’s Hospital, conveyed her gratitude to the surgical team for providing these crucial life-saving procedures.
She said that apart from the children of Fiji who had their successful heart surgeries, children from the other Pacific islands of Kiribati, Tuvalu, Solomon Islands, and Vanuatu were also recipients of this ‘gift of life’ free heart surgeries.
“All services including heart surgeries are rendered completely free of charge to the children. There is no billing counter whatsoever at the hospital”, said Namrata.
Since its opening in April 2022, the hospital has conducted 13,501 free child heart screenings and 246 free heart surgeries.
