Chandigarh, May 6
Having covered over 80,000 persons under the largest ever multicentric study in India on prevalence and risk factors of asthma, PGI has approached the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) for including five more centres in the country for the research.

The Rs 40 lakh study, being funded by the ICMR, has PGI’s Department of Pulmonary Medicine as the coordinating centre. The three other centres are located at Delhi, Kanpur and Bangalore. The PGI has now sent a request to the ICMR to include Lucknow, Jaipur, Mysore, Patna and Shimla as the other centres so that comparative figures of hilly, desert and other terrain can be obtained.

“We have written to the ICMR to include five other centres so that comparative figures from different parts of the country can be obtained as it is the largest study on prevalence of asthma in India, conducted till date,” informed Dr S.K. Jindal, head of Pulmonary Medicine Department.

Today being World Asthma Day, doctors say that various factors like environmental and changing life styles are the main reasons for the steep increase in asthma patients, especially children. While a study conducted by the PGI puts the percentage of asthmatic children in the city close to 7, in Delhi it has touched a record 10 per cent.

Dr Jindal said preliminary analysis of the study indicated 4 per cent prevalence of asthma amongst men and 2 per cent amongst women. “With men involved in more outdoor activities and various occupations and more into smoking than women, at least in India, are probably the reasons for higher asthmatic men,” he opined. He added that it was not just active smokers but also passive smokers who were vulnerable to asthma.

“It is very important to adopt uniform definition, random sampling and the same methodology at all the centres of this ICMR study so that the maximum possible comparative results can be obtained,” stressed Dr Jindal. He said one of the reasons for quite different figures during smaller studies was the adoption of a different definition and methodology.

Elaborating on the focus areas of the ongoing study, he said it would look into the rural and urban difference, distribution difference amongst males and females, figures as per occupation and educational levels.

Under the ICMR study, each centre would have a sample size of almost 20,000 persons. “When we had started the study, we were keen to include almost 10 centres, but the ICMR felt that we take it up in a phased manner and as such we began with four centres spread across the country,” said Dr Jindal. He said he was hopeful that the ICMR would grant approval for the inclusion of five other centres, the request for which had been sent last week.

Chandigarh, May 6
Nitin Trehan upset seeded player Vishal Gupta, 2-1, in the fourth Saurabh Khattar Memorial Snooker and Billiards Championship held at the Chandigarh Club, Sector 1, today.

Nitin Trehan beat Vishal Gupta, 39-55, 48-28, 61-29. In other matches of the day, Anand Chibber defeated Jaspal Singh, 39-75, 42-32, 67-25; Saurav Nayyar beat Vikram Jit Singh, 60-30, 23-62, 59-41; Rajesh Jain beat Amit Jain, 18-46, 54-42, 63-35; Harinder Singh beat Mukesh Chopra, 61-20, 64-52; Vineet Khosla defeated MS Grewal, 52-37, 64-24; Sanjay Talwar beat Rohit Daggar, 36-40, 60-20, 58-10; and Ajay Gupta beat Atul Arora, 55-11, 44-27.

The need to start the scheme was felt keeping in view the increased workload relating to income and expenditure.

The issue was discussed in the House in March, but a decision on the matter was kept pending.

At the meeting development works costing about Rs 2.79 crore for the town are also likely to be cleared.

The House is also scheduled to discuss the issue relating to the sanctioning of Rs 1.11 lakh for the repair of a funeral van apart from clearing the expenditure incurred on the function organised recently in connection with the laying of the foundation stone of the municipal library building in Silvi Park in Phase X and inauguration of the work of boring of three new tubewells. Among the other items on the agenda of the meeting, is the recruitment of 35 firemen on a regular basis.

The development works to be undertaken include the maintenance of roads, the strengthening of road dividers, the provision and repair of curb channels, the provision of streetlights, the removal of congress grass, the construction of road gullies and the development of the cremation grounds.

The House is also likely to clear a “lavish” expenditure of Rs 70,400 incurred on a public function held in connection with the laying of the foundation stone of the Silvi Park municipal library and the inauguration of the work of boring three new tubewells by Chaudhary Jagjit Singh, Local Government Minister, on April 25.