VISAKHAPATNAM: Periodic and mass screening of people vulnerable to chronic kidney disease (CKD) in affected villages by duly equipping primary and community health centres will help track and check the incidence, president of Paryavarana Parirakshana Samiti Y. Krishna Murthy advises.
A practising doctor, who has been leading the efforts to bring relief to the suffering villagers for more than two decades, sees no point in setting up dialysis centres, on which the government harps, as it is only an end-stage process that prolongs life.
“The primary and community health centres should be equipped with ultrasound machines. Blood and urine tests should be carried out regularly to examine patients,” he says.
Screening in early stages will help in advising the patients on the dietary care and other precautions.
Dr. Krishna Murthy explained the seriousness of kidney diseases at a meeting of the patients addressed by actor and Jana Sena Party founder Pawan Kalyan at Ichhapuram on Tuesday.
The disease is rampant in the seven mandals of Icchapuram, Kaviti, Kanchili, Mandasa, Sompeta, Palasa, and Vajrapu Kottur, called Uddanam (originally “Udyanavanam” because of its picturesque beauty).
“It begins in villages close to the national highway and the incidence increases as one goes into the interiors,” he said.
“In every village, about 30 per cent of the people, mostly in the age group of 20-60, are affected, resulting in the death of the bread-winners,” Dr. Krishna Murthy elaborated.
To help them, financial support should be extended to the families who had lost their bread-winners. This apart, children’s education should be ensured by the government, he said. Bus passes also should be given to the patients.
Similar medical predicament was faced in Sri Lanka, El Salvador and Nicaragua, Dr. Krishna Murthy said, adding that in Serbia and Croatia it took 10 years of research to find the root cause for the chronic disease.
V. Durga Rao, who holds a doctorate in genetics, said that in Sri Lanka a WHO-funded research project was carried out and a task force formed with the President himself heading it.
He said that such a task force should be formed with the President or the Chief Minister as its head and comprising doctors, scientists, and social workers.