I took Joel to his 18-month appt. the other day and the doctor discovered that he has a heart murmur. He wants Joel to go for an echo/EKG next week. I'm, of course, freaking out. The doc did say that many kids have a murmur at some point and they grow out of it, but he wants to make sure it's nothing serious. I'm trying to be positive, but I can't stop thinking worst case scenario. Has anyone experienced this? What was the outcome? Thanks.
Re: Heart Murmur in 18 month old
Hi, I am mostly a lurker here on the boards, but wanted to let you know that when I took my son for his 12 mo. appointment, his Dr. discovered a heart murmur.
Like your Dr., he said it was common for kids to have them and grow out of them, but it didn't stop me from freaking out that something was wrong! He's been to the Dr. a couple times since and everything is fine (still has the murmur though).
Good luck and from what I hear, slight murmurs are very common...
I'm sure you guy's murmur is 100% benign. If it was a serious, scary one it would have been discovered 18 months ago. He was probably born with a very small hole. It is now nearly closed, thus the louder murmur that was previously undetected. (Like a garden hose, a hole in the heart makes a louder noise the smaller it is- like when a hose is left to flow you can't hear it but as it is pinched closed, the sound of the water flowing is easily detected.)
My daughter had a serious, scary murmur that was discovered at birth. She is fine now, but I won't bore you with all the details...suffice to say she had open heart surgery about 8 months ago.
EKGs are really easy...echos not so much. Your son may be required to lay still for a looooooong time. K totally blew her last echo because she wouldn't lay still. I think I'll be drugging her into submission for her next one, lol.
I agree with Buckets. It is most likely a very small hole that your dc will outgrow.
My son had a murmur discovered at birth due to two "moderate" holes. He is doing fine and one hole has already closed completly. The test are not invasive at all, but it is hard to keep little ones still. My tip for the Echo is to bring snacks if you can -- a few boxes of rasins have helped him to sit still. A full tissue box that my ds could pull tissues from also did the trick one time. Good luck. I know it is scary, but it is pretty common.
At my DD's nine-month appointment, my pedi and another doc in her office thought they heard her heart galloping -- which could have been a sign of a potentially deadly bacterial infection around her heart.
The tests they were able to do at their office were inconclusive, so they sent us straight from their office to a pediatric cardiologist at a local children's hospital where they did a 30 minute ultrasound of her heart. She got to watch a baby Einstein video which totally entranced her, and DH and I were right there with her. She did great.
Ultimately, the cardiologist said everything was fine -- although she does have a bit of a murmur. I found out afterwards that my dad has had one his whole life and is completely healthy.
It was a horribly tense few hours. But I was very, very glad that my pedi was proactive and we could walk away at the end of the test knowing that DD was okay.
The odds are hugely in your favor that it's only a harmless murmur. Good luck, I'm sure the waiting is so hard!
DD1, 1/5/2008 ~~~ DD2, 3/17/2010
I know it's scary - we had to go the local childrens' hospital to get the test done, and it was frightening just to be inside there.
DS1 born June 2008 | m/c at 9w March 2011 | DS2 born April 2012
Oh...I wanted to suggest taking a sucker for his tests. We never let ds have sugar or candy but when he had to lie still for his test the doctor suggested giving him one (and had one on hand) and it worked like a charm!