Case Study: New York-Presbyterian/Morgan Stanley Children’s Hospital achieves life‑saving single‑surgery repair for a newborn’s complex congenital heart defect with Materialise

Saving a newborn with the support of 3D Printing

NewYork-Presbyterian/Morgan Stanley Children’s Hospital faced a prenatal diagnosis of a complex congenital heart defect—both the aorta and pulmonary arteries arising from the right ventricle plus a large ventricular septal defect—and needed a precise surgical plan for a newborn so small the anatomy was “no bigger than a walnut.” To prepare, the team partnered with Materialise and used its Mimics Innovation Suite and HeartPrint 3D‑printing service to better visualize the infant’s intricate heart anatomy before surgery.

Materialise converted the baby’s CT data into an accurate 3D HeartPrint model (produced at its U.S. facility) and delivered it within two days, giving surgeons a “road map” to plan a single definitive repair. Using Materialise’s model, Dr. Emile Bacha performed one successful operation when the infant was a week old (just over 7 lbs), avoiding the three or four staged palliative surgeries that would otherwise have been required and enabling a markedly improved clinical outcome.

NewYork-Presbyterian/Morgan Stanley Children’s Hospital

Emile Bacha

Congenital Heart Surgeon and Director of Congenital and Pediatric Cardiac Surgery