We have rewritten our book "Heart Children" - a practical handbook for parents covering all aspects of having a heart child including heart conditions, living with a heart child, hospitalisation, benefits etc.

The discovery that your child has a heart defect can be a very scary experience. It is at this time, following diagnosis, that parents experience feelings of shock, panic and stomach-churning anxiety. The alarming high-tech medical world into which the family is catapulted often causes further fright.

Although doctors and nurses do their best to describe matters, heart conditions are often so complicated and the surgical procedures so technical, that parents, in the first shock of diagnosis, often go away with an incomplete or erroneous picture of what is to happen.

Of course ignorance breeds fear as unanswered questions emerge. Parents have enough to cope with at this time without taking on needless anxiety. The authors, Philip G. Rees, Adelaide M. Tunstill, Tricia Pope and David Kinnear, seek firstly to help alleviate this.

Many other questions arise as your child goes through the process of hospitalisation, tests and surgery, so the second aim of the book is to provide a little comfort here, in giving some gentle explanations and sharing experiences.

Finally, the advancing techniques of paediatric cardiology have enabled many children to survive who would not have done so even 30 years ago. So now, many parents are encountering for the first time the joyful problems of dealing with schooling, physical ability, suitable careers, holidays (flying and travel abroad), driving, insurance, genetic counselling, contraception, marriage, mortgages and a thousand and one situations which are hardly noticed by 'ordinary families'. These produce questions for the family of a child with a heart problem and many of these topics are addressed in these pages.

All the main heart problems explained. Diagnosis and tests. What to tell your children. Echocardiagraphy, cardiac Catheterisation and the latest procedures explained. Surgery and heart transplantation. Everyday life with your 'heart' child. Answers to questions most often asked. Reactions, coping with feelings and relationships. Bereavement. Benefits and welfare help. Medicines explained. List of support organisations. Recommended reading list. Glossary of medical terms for parents.

The book is available from the office at a cost of £5.00 plus post and packing (£1.00p UK). Shipping abroad available on request.