PHYSICAL AND PSYCHOMOTOR DEVELOPMENT OF CHILDREN WITH CONGENITAL HEART DEFECTS: CURRENT APPROACHES AND CHALLENGES

Children with congenital heart defects (CHD) often experience delays in physical and psychomotor development, even after successful surgical correction. This review summarizes recent studies demonstrating the impact of CHD severity and type, timing of surgery, degree of hypoxia, and subsequent care on growth, body weight, motor skills, and overall psychoneurological status. Longitudinal cohort studies, motor development assessments in infants, the effects of early physical rehabilitation programs, as well as the role of social and biopsychosocial factors (e.g., nutritional status, access to medical care) have been analyzed. Key challenges have been identified: insufficient standardization of assessment methods, scarcity of long-term studies, poor integration of rehabilitation programs into clinical practice, and limited availability of specialized care in regional settings. The necessity of developing unified monitoring protocols and rehabilitation support, particularly under resource-limited conditions, is discussed.