Four children, aged between 4 and 16 years old, and three adults, aged between 17 and 40 years old, all suffering from congenital heart diseases, will undergo open heart surgeries from February 28 to March 2. The surgeries will be performed by a team of heart surgeons under Greek-born Afxentios Kalagkos, named “Coeurs Pours Tous”.
The childrens’ surgeries will take place at Makario Hospital, while the adults will be hospitalized in Nicosia General Hospital.
Dr. Kalagkos, born in Istanbul, performed his first heart surgeries on children in Cyprus in 2009. His second visit to the country followed some months later, during which he performed another three open heart surgeries on young children and one on an adult patient.
It is worth noting that one of these three children’s heart surgeries was performed on a prematurely born baby (22nd week of gestation) and concerned the closure of the ductus arteriosus. This was the first child heart surgery of its kind conducted in Cyprus.
Dr. Kalagkos is the creator of the humanitarian association “Coeurs Pour Tous” (Hearts for All). The Association was established in 1998 in Switzerland and includes doctors, nurses and in-vitro fertilization experts. “Coeurs Pour Tours” offer their services for free around the world.
Besides its cooperation with Dr. Kalagkos, the Health Ministry of Cyprus is proceeding with cooperating with Israel as well. On March 10, a team of Israeli doctors will arrive in Nicosia in order to perform operations featuring catheters on four children suffering from congenital heart diseases, aged between 4 and 12 years old.
The Israeli team of doctors will perform a new method of catheterization for the medical chronicles of Cyprus, while all surgeries will be hosted at the American Heart Institute in cooperation with the Makario Hospital. The Israeli doctors’ visit will be repeated at least once a month from now on.
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