Fifty per cent of the deaths caused by strokes can be prevented if proper first- aid is given to the patients.
Tertiary care hospitals
There is a delay by the time patients are brought to the tertiary care hospitals. A network of telemedicine centres where patients are given proper first-aid before they are brought to the main hospital is being developed by the Ramesh Hospitals Group said cardiologist and managing director of the group of hospitals P. Ramesh Babu.
Inauguration
Former President A.P.J. Abdul Kalam is inaugurating a 350-bedded multi super-specialty hospital of the group at Nagarampalem in Guntur on Sunday.
The new hospital with the latest bio-medical equipment will be the centre of the network of telemedicine centres. The group currently had 11 telemedicine centres, but their number would be taken up to 50, one in each mandal, in the next couple of years, he said.
This was however going to be a formidable task because it was quite difficult to get trained personnel to work in interior places and as an alternative, residents had be trained.
Tracing the development trajectory of his group of hospitals, Dr. Ramesh Babu said it began in a humble way as a cardiac centre in 1988.
He was the first to set up a cath lab in coastal Andhra in 1996. In 1998, Ramesh Hospitals entered the Limca Book of Records for achieving a success rate of 99.8 per cent in heart surgeries.
The exclusive heart hospital turned into a multi-speciality hospital in 2008 and the group started a 24-hour stroke centre with a 256 slice CT scanner supposed to be the first in united Andhra Pradesh in 2011.
Attracting super-specialists to work in Vijayawada was a huge challenge. Getting well trained paramedics to come here was also a tough task.
Bio-medical equipment
The cost of maintaining latest bio-medical equipment was also formidable, Dr. Ramesh Babu said. Some of the equipment had to be maintained as standby. Through total transparency – making the angiogram CDs available to patients for second opinion – the group of hospitals was able to gain public confidence, Dr. Ramesh Babu said.
Attracting super-specialists to work in Vijayawada is a huge challenge
Dr. Ramesh Babu
MD, Ramesh Hospitals Group
Former President A.P.J. Abdul Kalam is inaugurating a 350-bedded multi super-specialty hospital of Ramesh Hospitals Group at Nagarampalem in Guntur on Sunday
