heart murmer please advice

[gg1234]

i recently went for a private appointment with GP due to child having conjectivitis and in the appointment gp said that eye seems to be fine but kid has a murmer sound which needs to be checked by a cardiologist .I am scared to death today and cant sleep.my kid is quite active and has no such ailments or symptoms .Has anyone being in such a situation.I really doubt the GP cababiities .Would a heart defect no show any symptoms

Heart murmurs are incredibly common in children. 9 times out of 10 they are no cause for concern and aren't a sign of a defect- the likelihood is it would have been picked up at birth or when he was much younger if the murmur was loud or worrying.

If he has shown no symptoms at all, it's highly unlikely that there's anything wrong. The murmur could be caused by a small hole in his heart, which is present in all children at birth but sometimes doesn't close up. This is really common (I think something like 60% of the population has one or something like that?) and is no cause for concern. GPs don't want to mess around with anything to do with the heart, so tend to refer straight to cardiologist just be on the safe side.

I had one as a child but they bizarrely can't find it now. Dd was sent for tests after gp thought he heard one but scan showed she was fine.

Get it checked but don't worry. It's very common.

thank you dearies .I cant explain what i am going through today

At DD1’s 3 day check the paediatrician said to the 2 students that were with him “there is a very clear heart murmur you should be able to detect it. Turned to me & said she’ll need further checks someone from scbu will come & see you. I was sobbing, lady in opposite bed had to buzz for midwife. Long story short, she had ecg which detected hole in heart. She was allowed home but we had a referral to cardiology within a couple of weeks. More scans, they decided it didn’t need op. One of the nurses said to me the heart is a muscle, it needs exercise, don’t stop her doing anything. Anyway she had cardio appt every 6months, then year until just before she started school it had healed. Apart from the initial knob of a doctor we had 1st class care throughout. I’m sure everything will be fine OP.

DS was born with a heart murmur and spent 3 days in SCBU. It resolved itself during infancy and there's no sign of it now. I was worried because DSS has a heart condition he had from birth (tetrology of Falletts) and has a pacemaker, but DS is fine.

My son has what is called as an innocent heart murmur. Probably had it since birth but was only picked up by GP when he was two. Investigations show all fine and no issue. Try not to worry.

Sorry this is going to be a long reply

I have a murmur, they found it when I was 14 and I was probably born with it. It is usually caused by a slight malformation in one of the heart valves (usually the mitral and more rarely the tricuspid). The malformation is often just an extra piece of tissue on the flap that closes the valve, so that when the valve slams shut, the flap goes fwop and makes a sound that they can hear with a stethoscope.

Having a floppy valve (more properly called a prolapsed valve) is most often completely benign, no different to being born with a birth mark etc.

Occasionally it can mean that the valve doesnt seal completely when it slams shut and so some blood can leak backwards instead of it all being pushed forwards into the system. This is actually the murmur (but many GPs will call the sound of the valve flopping a murmur as they are not trained enough to detect the difference between the fwop and the backwash sounds). Murmurs can be mild, moderate or severe depending upon the amount of blood that backwashes. I had no backwash with my valve until my third pregnancy when I developed a mild murmur. It has no impact on my life or ability to do anything. If I do progress to a moderate or severe murmur, then there are steps they can take to fix the valve by going in through a vein with a wire and doing a micro surgery (very cool new age stuff)

Having a prolapsed valve can also put you at slightly increased risk of heart arrythmias called PVCs and SVT. Both are benign at low levels and mostly just annoying.

So your DC should see a cardiologist and get an ECG and more importantly an Echocardiogram of the heart (like an ultrasound but of the heart not fetus). That will be able to tell you that the structure of the heart is normal, if there is a prolapse and where it is, if there is backwash and how much it is. Given your DC has no symptoms I think it is highly highly unlikely that there is any problem beyond a benign flap in the heart that will cause no long term problems. But it is important to get it checked so that you know about it.

If you would like more info please pm me.

My son has an innocent murmur that can be picked up occasionally, but structurally there is nothing wrong. My daughter has a defect with her aortic valve and mild regurgitation but oddly no murmur.
I also have a MVP which is a prolapsed mitral valve and a slight murmur but so far it hasn’t given me any problems.

My DS is 3 and has an innocent heart murmur. It was picked up in a similar way a when we went to see our GP about a cold/cough. I was terrified!

DS was referred and had an ECG and a scan, his heart was normal. The cardiologist said that innocent murmurs are very common in young children.