HEALTH

‘Pre-natal period crucial’
From Our Correspondent

LUDHIANA, Sept 14 — Rotract Club of Government College for Women, an offshoot of Rotary Club of Ludhiana North, in association with NSS, organised a seminar on ‘motherhood’ here today.

Dr Manorama Verma, Head, Department of Paediatrics, Christian Medical College and Hospital, stressed on the need of regular check-ups at the time of pregnancy. She spoke on the precautionary measures that should be taken during the pre-natal period.

Dr Yogesh Chitwal, also from the same department at CMC, spoke about the important measures to be taken at the time of delivery and the post-natal period. She said, ‘‘The place of delivery must be decided in advance. It must be clean, well-ventilated and have adequate light so as to prevent any kind of infection to mother or baby. A gynaecologist and a paediatrician must be readily available at the birth place to prevent any complication that may arise for the mother or the baby at that crucial time.’’

‘‘The danger signs for the mother at the time of delivery are excessive bleeding, fever and membrane rupture leading to urine like discharge. The mother must be given a good diet and she should keep herself very clean all the time,’’ Dr Chitwal further explained.

About baby care, she said, ‘‘The first cry of the baby gives the indication that the baby is normal. If the baby does not cry at the time of birth, it clearly signifies that the baby is not getting the proper amount of oxygen. Even a two-minutes delay at that time can lead to permanent brain damage and the child may suffer for the rest of its life.’’

The average weight of a normal Indian baby is between 2.8 kg to 3.2 kg, even though a child born to Punjabi parents is generally more healthy, Dr Chitwal said.

The chief guest on the occasion was Dr Silis J. Charles, director, CMC. Mrs Sukhwinder Kaur, incharge of the college Rotract Club and NSS, informed that the two organisations would arrange a seminar on AIDS in the next month.

Exercise and ischaemic heart disease
 By Dr G.S.Grewal
LUDHIANA

What are the major risk factors for ischaemic heart disease (IHD)? 

The major risk factors are high blood pressure (systolic or diastolic), high cholesterol levels ( total or LDL fraction ) and smoking. Other factors such as diabetes, obesity and sedentary habits can contribute to risk and are described as secondary risk factors. Disease risk increases with age in men. In females, this is mainly determined by menopausal status. An estimated 30 per cent of the risk is determined by genetic predisposition and subjects with family history of vascular events in young age or with many risk factors in several relatives.

Regular physical activity reduces coronary events at any age, if it is performed with progressively increased loads, correct warm up procedures and detraining. This holds true for both leisure time and working activity. Events occurring during physical activity are much more frequent in subjects with coronary occlusion in major risk factors or those undertaking strenuous physical activity.

Regular exercise reduces total cholesterol, triglyceride and fibrinogen levels in the blood; increases HDL cholesterol; and lowers both systolic and diastolic blood pressure, but only in subjects with a particular genetic make-up. However, it is not yet known if these benefits are due to direct effect of exercise or also to changes in lifestyle such as a more healthy food intake or a reduction in smoking.

Cardiac performance progressively decreases with age, but this trend can be partially reversed by exercise. The increases in the prevalence of CAD and mean population age will probably increase the demand for cardiac services by approximately 30 per cent in the next 15 years. Exercise-training programmes will become even more important in mean or even advanced age.

Aerobic exercise has positive benefits on a number of physiological processes; systolic and diastolic blood pressure, vasodilatation of peripheral vessels, muscle vascular bed volume, metabolic activity of muscles and activity of lipoprotein lipase. Exercise is also able to modify the sympathy-vagal balance by decreasing sympathetic and increasing vagal activity, at least during normal training. Sudden death, acute myocardial infarction and unstable angina mainly occur during the early morning and in winter time. Such events could partially be explained by increases in sympathetic activity, blood pressure and platelet aggregation in these conditions.

Strenuous exercise does not lead to added improvement and may for those at high risk, increase risk of an event during activity. Risk reduction is optimum after a few months of regular activity,that is, of least 30 minutes duration resulting in a heart rate of about two-thirds maximal for a total of least 2 hours a week.

Exercise plays a fundamental role in rehabilitation. Regular training should be undertaken with supervision of cardiologist with serial stress, ECG or stress echo. Stratification of patients using criteria such as previous AMI, old age, positive stress ECG and cardiac heart failure, as well as presence of major risk factors, is vital in order to determine the best treatment and use of resources.

SPORT

KVM in finals of cricket tourney
From Our Correspondent

LUDHIANA, Sept 14 — Kundan Vidya Mandir (KVM) school today defeated Samrala zone (SMZ) by a margin of three wickets thus reaching the finals of Punjab Schools Inter-Zone (Under-19) Cricket Tournament held at Baddowal.

KVM won the toss and invited SMZ to bat first. SMZ made 109 runs in 18 overs before losing all wickets. KVM achieved the target of 110 runs in 19.4 overs, losing seven wickets.

The fiery bowling by Mohit of KVM led the team to comfortable victory. Mohit took three wickets in three overs for ten runs. Varan Puri also bowled well and took two wickets in four overs for nine runs. Karan Goel, Dinesh and Munish took one wicket each.

Manish and Aseem batted well and made 24 and 20 runs, respectively, to make victory easy for their team.