[Congenital heart disease: present situation and future prospects].

Rev Esp Cardiol. 2005;58(12):1381-4 1381 We are all well aware of the important advances made in the realm of cardiology in recent years, but, undoubtedly, they have had a special impact in the realm of congenital heart disease. Since 1938, when Robert Gross performed the first ligature of a patent ductus arteriosus; 1944, when William Blalock, pressured by Helen Taussig, created the first systemic pulmonary shunt in a child with cyanotic congenital heart disease (tetralogy of Fallot); and 1945, when Gross and Crafoord, working independently, repaired an aortic coarctation, the evolution of the treatment of patients with congenital heart disease has been spectacular. This has given birth to a new population of adolescents and adults with congenital heart defects that are more or less repaired (practically never cured), that requires specialized cardiological monitoring. We are facing a new challenge that does not appear to have an easy solution, especially if we take into account the fact that, in recent years, given that congenital heart disease was basically a pediatric problem, diseases of this type have been concentrated in pediatric services, and most adult cardiologists have forgotten they exist. It is necessary to carry out a far-reaching restructuring of the health care system, involving the creation of units and/or programs devoted to the monitoring and management of these patients, the training of specialists in the field who work closely with cardiologists and pediatric cardiac surgeons and, above all, the provision of cardiology services with the necessary resources to attend to this new task. But, how many cardiologists will it be ED I TO R I A L S