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- I have a sibling with congenital heart disease.

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Should we be worried about them being physically active

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and overexerting their heart?

4
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(soft music)

5
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- The heart's a muscle and like all your muscles

6
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when you exercise it it gets stronger.

7
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But when children have heart problems people are concerned

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sometimes that making the heartbeat faster or

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making it work harder which happens 
when you exercise will cause more problems

10
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We know that children with congenital heart disease

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are often less active than other kids and that

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means they miss out on opportunities to play with their friends,

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they might not learn the skills they need to be active,

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and it makes them more likely to have health 
problems when they're older as adults.

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Our research study

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observed 195 children with congenital

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heart disease and innocent heart murmurs

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most of whom were from CHEO

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and we measured their physical activity,

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the time they sit still and their movement skills

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starting when they were one or two years old

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and every eight months until they were five years old.

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Our discovery was that

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children who are the least active when

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they're two or three years of age
are still the children who are

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least active when they're five years old 
or older and going to school.

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The most important thing is that children with

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congenital heart disease feel confident that they

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can be active and play with their friends.