(Sound of little Mason coming out of the home:) His Mom says, "Let's go, ready to go, all right?"

It's early Friday morning. Mom Bea says, "Let's go see Dr. Rulard." Check up day for Mason Almaguer of Bakersfield.

Steve Almaguer, Mason's father says "He's rambunctious, He's a brat, He's everything you would expect of a normal kid."

But at just four weeks old, Mason's Mother Bea noticed something wrong. "I was taking him a bath. I noticed him to curl up in a ball and his body looked blue and I knew at that time I had a gut feeling that something was not right."

Little Mason was diagnosed with "Tetralogy of Fallot", a combination of four heart defects resulting in low-oxygen blood, circulating through his body.

Bea Almaguer said, "My heart just dropped. The thought we had this healthy baby boy was dashed, knowing the fact we had a very sick baby on our hands."

One week later, little Mason was on the operating table. Doctors performed successful open heart surgery, saving Mason's life.

So now, every six months, Mason and his parents travel north near Fresno.

At Children's Hospital, Mason is just one of the many Kern County children who come here for check-ups and surgeries. 200 to 250 pediatric heart surgeries are done here each year.

Eight years as a cardiologist, Dr. Kenneth Rulard evaluates about 15 young patients a day and is Mason's primary cardiac physician.

Dr. Kenneth Rulard/Pediatric Cardiologist: "So when he went for his first surgery at a month of age, Dr. McDonald corrected his heart condition where he closed the hole in this lower chamber and because of an abnormal coronary artery, he had to put in an artificial pulmonary valve replacing his pulmonary valve."

To get a clearer idea of how his heart is doing, Mason undergoes an echo-cardiogram which takes pictures of his heart. But being poked and prodded each time he visits a doctor, it's now difficult for him to stay still during exams, fearful of what might happen next.

So, how is he doing? Weill have the answer a little later in our story.

Like Mason, Little Jake Byrom is also 2 and learning to beat the drums. But it's Jake's beating heart that his father Monty, a Bakersfield musician and his Mother Joy are most concerned about.

Joy, Byrom's mother, "He wasn't screaming. He wasn't doing the typical infant screaming and yelling".

What the Byrom's thought was a healthy boy at birth, quickly changed.

Joy Byrom:, "I just got emotional for a minute and I held it together and she said just make sure your husband is there with you."

Jake was diagnosed with a rare, tricuspid atresia and a ventricular septal defect. Translated: He was born without a heart valve along with a hole in his heart. They found out from a doctor by phone in San Francisco.

Monty Byrom (Jake's father): "Well, Hey!!! Hold on a second !!! It was just the worst moment of our lives and to get it over the phone because in this nice, big metropolis of Bakersfield, there's not one pediatric cardiologist."

His lips looking blue, just two and a half months old, Jake was rushed by helicopter to Children's hospital near Fresno. He had open heart surgery two days later.

Jake's surgery lasted six hours. The Byrom's say the longest six hours of their lives, But even so, their troubles were far from over.

Jake's entire left leg had turned black and purple and the Doctor was reluctant to give the Byrom's a diagnosis they didn't want to hear.

Joy: "So finally I said, What are you trying to say, you know. And he says he could lose his leg."

Fortunately for little Jake, the color to his leg began coming back the next day.

John Coulson is the Doctor who first gave the Byrom's the news of Jake's heart condition.

Coulson (Pediatric Cardiologist), "Almost one percent of all babies born have some kind of congenital heart defects".

At least once a month, he makes the trip to Bakersfield.

Dr. Coulson: "Are you taking medication?"

Doing dozens of checkups on patients like 13 year old Phuong Nguyen, saving families the drive to Fresno or Los Angeles.

Dr. John Coulson: "Presently, there's no board certified cardiologist based in Kern County and there's a significant need for such services."

Steve Okoli is a registered cardiac sonographer and supplies the equipment necessary for check-ups.

Just over three years ago, Children's hospital closed their Bakersfield satellite office, but Okoli, wanted to stay.

Steve Okoli says, "The need for children at this specialty is very much needed here so I decided I would just stay back and see if I can get it to work. Yes, I am staying busy."

As a way to provide a support network for families of children with heart defects, a Bakersfield Chapter of the National, Non Profit Organizations, "Mended Little Hearts" was formed just this year.

Joy says: "We talk about how our kids are doing. We talk about medical issues, We talk about different doctors, different surgeries."

Meeting once a month, right now the group is small on the Saturday we visited, only Joy and Bea were there.

Bea and Joy talking: "So what you're saying is maybe they'll be able to make a valve?"

Their primary goal, to get more Kern County families involved.

So that brings us back to Mason. What is his prognosis after pictures are taken of his heart from an echo-cardiogram?

Bea says: "At this point, he doesn't have any restrictions. He's able to play, jump, do everything he wants to do. There's nothing holding him back.

So far, Mason has had not one, but two surgeries, the second came at 10 months old.

Jake is expected to have another surgery at age three or four.

For these brave, little guys, it's been a long road in a very short time, and they literally have the scars to prove it.

These families hope by telling their stories, they'll reach other families here going through similar circumstances.

The group, Mended Little Hearts, meets the third Saturday each month at 10 am. at Memorial Hospital's Founder's Hall. For more information, call Bea 665-8759.

Another goal is that one day a full-time pediatric Cardiologist will call Bakersfield home.

For now, only Dr. Coulson volunteers to come down to Bakersfield on a part-time basis.

Others in the local health field we spoke with say because of the smaller size of our market and smaller pool of patients, it's difficult to recruit specialists to leave bigger cities to come here full-time . . . at least for the moment.