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The rebirth of cardiac surgery in Sudan
Ahmed ElSayed1, Elamin Elawad Elnur2
1Department of Surgery, AlShaab Teaching Hospital, Alzaeim Alazhari University, Khartoum, Sudan.
Background:
Cardiac surgery is nowadays an integral part of a complete national health service.
Methods:
In this paper the rebirth of cardiac surgery in Sudan from 1998 till 2007 is given by means of a literature search, personal interviews and searching hospital records.
Results:
A summary of the initial birth of these services in 1959 till its demise in 1993 is first mentioned to set the stage for the subsequent period of sustainable growth. The surgical workforce and the surgical workload in the latter period is documented and showed that in the period from 1998 to 2007 2,868 open heart operations were done in three centers in Sudan. All these centers are based in Khartoum but they cater for all the country. It is estimated that (with the addition of two centers after the study period) the service provided would need to be quadrupled (by doubling the number of centers to 10 and increasing their capacity so as to cater for the whole country). The case mix of operations done is predominantly valvular comprising 63.2% of the total followed by congenital cardiac cases at 22.8% and then ischaemic at 11.9%.
Conclusions:
The results imply that a big effort has to be done in the primary healthcare sector to try and eradicate rheumatic heart disease which is the main cause of the valvular lesions.
