Congenital heart disease is the most common birth defect globally and an important cause of heart failure and death in childhood and early adulthood in Africa.

Now, those born with heart disease (congenital heart disease or CHD) in Africa stand to gain from an R 12,000,000 grant from the United Kingdom Medical Research Council (UKMRC) to the University of Cape Town, in partnership with the University of Manchester (UoM). The award will enable a multi-disciplinary research team to develop a comprehensive understanding of the nature and profile of CHD on the continent.  Ultimately, the aim of the grant is to reduce premature mortality from cardiovascular disease through improved diagnosis, management and follow-up of children and adults with CHD.

The announcement comes on the cusp of Congenital Heart Disease Awareness Week (7-24 February 2017) and in the first month of Grade R for Thaakirah Mathews, a success story of early diagnosis and treatment. Thaakirah was three months old in 2011 when her mother, Raadhiyah, took her to the Red Cross War Memorial Children’s Hospital for severe diarrhoea. She was eventually diagnosed with a set of complex heart defects known as Double Outlet Right Ventricle (DORV), a condition which affects 1 in 500 000 people.

Two years after her diagnosis, and a series of operations, Thaakirah received the Nikaidoh-bex procedure a first-time surgical procedure of its kind on a child’s heart at the Hospital. With the benefit of early diagnosis and continuous excellent care, an opportunity not available to many on the African continent, Thaakirah has managed to thrive and have a happy childhood post surgery.

Currently, there is little research and analysis of the patterns, causes, and effects of  CHD in African populations (what is referred to as the epidemiology of the disease); available evidence so far suggests that the CHD burden is substantially underestimated because of incomplete recording of poor early outcomes, particularly for more severe malformations

“There is an urgent need for research into congenital heart disease (CHD) to be conducted in Africa,” says Prof Bongani Mayosi Dean of UCT’s Faculty of Health Sciences, and a Co-Principal Investigator of the study. “The resource-related challenges that African countries face in caring for patients with CHD and their families are compounded by the lack of an African specific evidence base.”

An MRC-led Foundation Award, this grant is part of the MRC's first phase of research funding anticipated from the £1.5bn Global Challenges Research Fund (GCRF). The 41 Foundation Awards led by the MRC, and supported by four UK Research Councils, have been allocated to support ambitious, novel and distinctive research in non-communicable diseases and infections, with the aim of improving the health and prosperity of low and middle-income countries through harnessing the UK’s research expertise.

“This grant will fund a north-south partnership in Congenital Heart Disease (CHD),  which will generate new knowledge on the epidemiology and outcome of congenital heart disease (CHD) in South Africa,” says Co-Principal Investigator Prof Liesl Zuhlke, a paediatric cardiologist who recently established the Children’s Heart Disease Research Unit at Red Cross War Memorial Children’s Hospital.

To date, no genetic studies of CHD have been conducted in sub-Saharan African populations. To improve the outcome for CHD patients in Africa, it is necessary to provide further underpinning research informing selection of methods of treatment.