Former President Abdul Kalam will launch in Coimbatore on Sunday K.G. Hospital’s preventive cardiology programme, which will screen adults and children for heart diseases, especially adults for the risk factors that can lead to cardiac problems.
Hospital Chairman G. Bakthavathsalam said in a release that the project would screen two lakh children and as many adults. The emphasis was on early detection of problems in children and of the factors in adults that could cause heart attack.
Dr. Bakthavathsalam said that 40 years ago, heart attack used to occur in people when they were in their fifties and sixties and many died because of non-availability of drugs. Patients had to depend on pain-relieving morphine and atropine injections.
But, in the past 40 years, things had changed for better and for worse. Things were now better because the problems could be diagnosed early with advanced technology and right interventions could be made at an appropriate time.
Mandatory check-up for blood pressure, blood sugar level helped in knowing whether people suffered from coronary artery disease.
On the other hand, patients who developed the disease had to undergo costly treatment.
Preventive cardiology was an alternative to costly treatment. It involved only lifestyle change – giving up smoking, alcohol and food that caused high cholesterol and by getting into regular exercise.
In the case of children, they were affected by congenital defects that prevented them even from playing.
The hospital said it screened 500 school children last week and found that 50 of them had such defects.
They could be given proper surgical or medical treatment.
