Private hospitals should come forward to render services to the rural poor so that no patient in the State dies for want of cardiac care in hospitals said N.R.Sivapathy, Minister for Education, Sports and Youth Welfare, inaugurating the 100-bedded exclusive cardiac care centre, ‘Kauvery Heartcity’, here on Sunday.
Any medical institute must be built on three pillars – clinical services, teaching, and research, said Mayil Vahanan Natarajan, vice-chancellor, Tamil Nadu Dr.M.G.R medical university, speaking on the occasion. Infrastructure is disproportionate to patients and a demand-supply gap of super specialists existed, he noted, adding that the State varsity planned to introduce Ph.D and fellowship and research programmes to bridge the gap.
Neither government nor the people have woken up to the fact that coronary artery disease is high as 12 per cent in adult population in India, the highest in any country, said cardiac surgeon M.R.Girinath. What is more worrying is that coronary artery disease has gone up by 100 per cent in last 15 years.
A combination of the wrong kind of food with too much of salt and oil, lack of exercise, stress in workplace, obesity and no medical insurance saw many land in hospitals in dire circumstances, said Dr.Girinath. “We need to see people come in early. Periodical medical check-ups and signing up for medical insurance from a young age is important so that patients are not burdened with catastrophic expenses when they fall ill.”
Dedicating the Rs.40-crore worth new facility to the city, S.Chandrakumar, director, Kauvery Hosptials, attributed the success of the hospital group to the team for specialists.
From a cardiac wing at Tennur in 2004 to an exclusive centre, the hospital’s growth has spanned more than 3,000 angioplasty and 1,000 bypass procedures, said cardio thoracic surgeon T.K.Senthilkumar.
The three-storied structure with high-end operation theatres, capacity to accommodate 500 outpatients a day, and separate clinics for heart failure, hypertension, and valve replacement would provide all the services to people from Tiruchi.
