Non Cyanotic Heart Disease

When you're diagnosed with non-cyanotic heart disease, you're essentially suffering from congenital heart disease that lacks the trait of cyanosis, which is a bluish discoloration to the skin. But non-cyanotic heart disease isn't a sole condition; it's actually a grouping of disorders that affect the heart. However, most of these disorders aren't always obvious at the time of birth, and it may take years for the heart defect to make its presence known, if at all.

Septal Defects

• Two of the more common non-cyanotic heart diseases are a ventricular septal defect or an atrial septal defect. With these conditions, you're basically born with a hole in your heart. More commonly referred to as either VSD or ASD, the location of the hole often dictates whether you're suffering from one or the other defect, be it the lower or upper chambers of the heart, respectively. For the most part, this sort of defect isn't that problematic for a child, especially when they're relatively small.

  In many cases, the hole will actually heal or close on its own. If the defect is more sizeable, medical intervention may be necessary to manually close the abnormal opening.

Patent Ductus Arteriosus

• Another potential cause of non-cyanotic heart disease is a defect known as patent ductus arteriosus. And much like the septal defects, this condition finds an abnormal opening that is present at the time of birth. But instead of this opening affecting the walls or chambers of your heart, it's actually located between the major blood vessels to the heart. Depending on the size and severity of the condition, this opening may close on its own or need a surgery to seal it.

Stenosis

• It is also possible to suffer from non-cyanotic heart disease as a result of stenosis, which is more or less a narrowing of a blood vessel. With this particular defect, it's typically isolated to either the aortic valve or the pulmonary valve of your heart. In either case, the valve doesn't open as it should normally, causing a change in blood flow to or away from your heart. And much like the other defects, the condition may remedy itself or need medical intervention to open the blockage.

Aortic Coarctation

• Sometimes, a diagnosis of non-cyanotic heart disease is due to an aortic coarctation, which is ultimately a narrowing along the aorta. Though this defect isn't actually found in the heart, but the major artery to this organ, it's still considered a form of heart disease. And unlike the other non-cyanotic defects, an aortic coarctation usually requires medical intervention to either open or remove the narrowed section of the blood vessel.

Cushion Defect

• Non-cyanotic heart disease may also include something known as an endocardial cushion defect. With this condition, the heart actually lacks a wall between two of its chambers, either the ventricles or atrial. Essentially considered another form of a hole in the heart, this condition requires the construction of a wall between those chambers lacking this at birth.