The Need
Congenital cardiac defects are one of the leading causes of death among infants during the first year of life. In Egypt, approximately 1 million children are expected to be suffering from congenital cardiac defects, and half of them are expected to need urgent intervention to survive, either in the form of immediate catheterization or surgery.

The Pediatric Cardiology Unit at Abu El Reech hospital in Cairo is a governmental specialized referral center for congenital, rheumatic heart diseases and cardiomyopathy cases. It is considered to be one of the few centers in Egypt that is able to deal with the very critical neonate, infant or child with a heart problem.

Currently the Pediatric Cardiology unit receives around 1 million EGP yearly from Cairo University, while it needs more than 12 million EGP to operate. The unit manages to cover its deficit from sporadic fundraising efforts, which limits its ability to plan future expansions.

Project Riche
Project Riche is a collaboration between Care with Love and the Paediatric Cardiology Unit at Abu El Reech hospital to enable underprivileged children with heart disease get access to high quality medical services; together with providing the support for the running cost of maintain it; in an effort to save as many young lives. We aspire to improve the quality of life of those children, turning them into a future contributing force for the ultimate prosperity of our country.

Short-term Objectives
• Double the number of children treated yearly in the catheterization labs from 1000 to 2000.
• Reduce children’s waiting time by at least 50%, which would result in saving more lives and reducing children and parents suffering.
• Upgrade the HR calibre from nursing, nurse aid, and technicians to meet international standards of health care.
• Provide all the technical support for ensuring world-class infection control measures.

Long-term Objective
Riche’s long-term objective is to create an endowment of 120 million EGP in 10 years to enable the unit to smoothly operate, and conduct future strategic planning based on established resources, in order to continue being a leading centre in Egypt and the Middle East in the treatment of children with heart disease.