‘EP procedures safer than bypass surgery’
Tribune News Service

Mohali, February 2
“Electro-physiological procedures of the heart are safer and cheaper than an open-heart bypass surgery,’’ said Dr David Martin, Director, Cardiac Arrhythmia Service, Lahey Clinic Medical Centre, Burlington, MA, USA today.

Heading a delegation from the Centre on invitation from Dr Jagmohan Verma at the Fortis Heart Institute, Dr Martin is looking forward to exchange of information on electro-physiological (EP) procedures while assisting Fortis doctors in EP procedures.

With more than 15 years of experience in cardiac procedures, Dr Martin explained that there were two basic types of malfunctions in a heart — physical and electrical.

The physical malfunction may be due to valve failure or blockage in arteries. “This causes the heart to slow down, in other words, causes slow heart beat. The rectification methods may range from open-heart surgery to bypass.

The electrical defect is caused when the heart develops a problem in functioning due to lack of electrical pulses or more than normal pulses. This condition may be caused by a hort circuit. This means that the electrical pulses develop an independent route – a new muscular route. This normally increases the heartbeat. The correction method in this is an EP surgery,” he said, adding that the electrical defect in the heart is usually a congenital defect.

Electrophysiology involved a minute insertion of an instrument to correct the malfunction of the heart beat. The EP process was less expensive. “It costs only Rs 40000 -Rs 50000 for the surgery, whereas previously the patient would have to go for an open-heart surgery, which is very expensive.”

Giving details of the procedure, Dr Martin said in this process, the heart was first mapped for the ‘short circuit’. “Then, with the help of cathode rays, the short circuit is burned, thereby breaking the circuit. The burn is generally of 2 millimeter – it is undetectable by the human eye,” he added.

Indian chicken safe, says experts
Tribune News Service

Panchkula, February 2
The Indian chicken is absolutely safe and there is no chance of an outbreak of bird flu in the country, poultry experts said at a seminar here today.

Addressing the seminar organised by the Pixie Publication and the American Soybean Association, Dr S.K. Khanna, a poultry consultant, contended that the virus was not communicable to human beings. In Pakistan the incidence of disease was reported from Karachi and Sind districts only, he added.

Another consultant, Dr Jagjit Singh, said the recent EU ban on the import of poultry products from South Asian countries should act as a catalyst for boosting exports from India.

Forecasting a bright future for the Indian poultry industry, Dr Ramesh Thaper of the American Soybean Association stated that India had emerged as the fifth largest exporter of poultry products in the world and there was still scope for more exports from Andhra Pradesh,Tamil Nadu and Karnataka.

The president of the Broiler Farmers Association of Chandigarh, Mr Charan Pal Singh, regretted that due to bird flu scare the prices of the poultry products had come down.

Mr N.K. Gupta, General Manager of the Pixie Publication, proposed a vote of thanks while Ms Sarita Kaul welcome the guests.

SPORTS

A school that will lay stress on sports
Our Sports Reporter

Chandigarh, February 2
Chitkara International School, which is coming up in Sector 25 (West) here, has planned innovative means of sporting activity to be undertaken in the school. The school, a new addition to the chain of institutions run by the Chitkara Education Trust, will start the first academic session from the next month.

According to Mr Mohit Chitkara, vice-president of the trust, sports play an important role in the overall development of a child.

He said at their school they would ensure that their students developed self-esteem and confidence.

“The sporting facilities to be offered at school include an aerobics room, a swimming pool, soccer field, squash and basketball courts,” he said.

The campus would also have badminton and lawn tennis courts.

They would get services of specialised coaches to hone their skills.

Mr Mohit, who is also the CEO of the Chitkara International School, said in the two to five year age group, the focus would be on body awareness and responding to movement stimuli.

In the six to eight years category, the focus would be on increased body awareness, rhythm and coordination, memory and hand-eye coordination. Games like badminton and basketball would be included for this age group, along with swimming.

For senior students, there would be facilities for baseball, lawn tennis, table tennis, badminton, cricket etc.

The school would have a cricket ground and players would get training from an experienced coach..

International Testing Centre enter quarterfinal
Our Sports Reporter

Chandigarh, February 2
A half century (51 runs of 42 balls) by Narinder Walia and fine bowling display (5 wickets for 12) by Ajay Bhardwaj enabled the International Testing Centre beat United India Insurance by 20 runs and enter the quarterfinals of the inaugural Er Bharat Keso Gupta Memorial Tournament at Sector 3 stadium, Panchkula.

Brief scores: IITC X1 — 137 for 8 in 22 overs (Narinder Walia 51, Rajesh Vaid 31, Harminder Bawa 24, Vaneet Chawla 18, Ajay Sharma 3 for 19, Amarjeet Kumar 3 for 21). UII XI — 117 runs all out (Rajinder 33 , Amarjeet Kumar 31, Sanjay Bhatia 28, S.S. Negi 20, Ajay Bhardwaj 5 for 12, Inderjeet Saini 3 for 14).

In another match, fine batting by Lakshay Sharma (57 no) enabled Indo-Dutch Systems defeat Mount Cable XI by seven wickets.

Mount Cable XI —103 all out (Vikram Sharma 36 no, Aman 25, Harjit Bobby 24, Rohit Chauhan 3 for 22, Rohit Walia 3 for 20, Jagjit Saini 2 for 19, Parveen 2 for 22); IDS XI — 105 for 3 (Lakshay Sharma 57 no, Bhavneet Singh 24 no, Jagdish 2 for 17).

In another tie, JL Morison XI defeated NABARD XI by 10 wickets.

NABARD XI — 94 all out (Prayas Panchuri 35,Vinod Kumar 28, Ravi 18, Manjeet Sharma 4 for 15, Pawan Sharma 2 for 16, Om Parkash 2 for 20, Ankur Sharma 2 for21); JL Morrison XI — 95 for no loss in 10.2 overs (Mrinal Barwa 45 no, Abby Kumar 40).

Ball badminton teams

Jagdeep Kaur of IS Dev Samaj Girls Senior Secondary School, Sector 21, and Shiv Kumar of St Joseph’s School, Sector 44, will lead the UT girls and boys teams, respectively, in the 49th Junior National Ball Badminton Championship to be held at Swai Man Singh Stadium, Jaipur, from February 5 to 8.

The team are: (girls) — Jagdeep, Roma, Pooja, Nancy, Kanchan, Shikha, Santosh, Anisha, Monu and Promila; (boys) — Shiv, Ankit, Sarwan, Naresh, Chetan, Vivek, Pravesh, Abhineet, Manmeet and Munish.

Tae kwon do camp

A 10-day basic taekwon-do coaching camp was organised by the Anglo Tae kwon do Club, at Gayatri Model School, Ramgarh, near Panchkula, here on Monday. Later, the participants were given merit certificates. Ms Aarti Sharma, Principal, and office-bearers of the club were also present on the occasion.

Ryan International School to have skating rink
Arvind Katyal

Chandigarh, February 2
Ryan International School in Sector 49 is a branch of St Xavier’s Group of schools, Mumbai. It began its first session in April last year. “The school wants to give every child a varied experience in sports and other co-curricular activities, explained Ms Poonam Sharma, Principal.

She said the objective and methodology of the Ryan group of schools was to take care of child in every respect.

At present, they have Montessori I, II and III , Class I to Class VII. From next year, they will have class VIII and so on till class XII in phased manner,

Ms Sharma said, in their allotted five acres of land, they would set up a skating rink, basketball court and one tennis court.

She said they would like to provide facilities for football, hockey and other disciplines also, considering the demand of the students.

She said for those children who would like to excel in mind sport or martial sport, they would house the facilities for chess, carrom and karate and yoga.

Specialised sports academies would also be set up to nurture the right kind of talent. She said in another four months, these facilities would be available to children.

Kila Raipur lad for national hockey camp
Our Sports Reporter

Chandigarh, February 2
Sukhpal Singh of Kila Raipur village (Ludhiana) has done his village proud by making it to the national camp for the Junior World Cup Hockey (under-21) Tournament.

Sukhpal Singh, who plays for the Punjab Police, had been a key player in the DDA Invitational National Hockey Meet recently held at Delhi. He was the star player from his side. Sukhpal is a product of Government Senior Secondary School, Kila Raipur. He learnt game technicalities from Darshan Singh, DPE, during training at the Grewal Hockey Academy. Later, Paramjit Singh polished his game and under his coaching he was able to represent Punjab in various national school games. He drew his inspiration from his father, a former national-level hockey player. 

GMC win cricket title
Our Sports Reporter

Chandigarh, February 2
A brilliant performance by Sanjeev Massey of Government Medical College, Sector 32, who scored 53 runs and bagged two wickets for just 16 runs, enabled his team in defeating Punjab Engineering College, Sector 14, by 16 runs to win the title in the 10th Inter-institutional Cricket Tournament, played here today.

Sanjeev was also adjudged the man of the match. Manoj and Anil Guleria of PEC were declared best batsman and best wicket-keeper, respectively.

Brief scores: GMC — 151 runs for eight wickets in 30 overs (Sanjeev Massey 53, Sunit Sharma 25 no, Rajinder 3 for 33); PEC — 135 runs all out in 29.4 overs (Manoj 48, Rajinder 28, Sanjeev Massey 2 for 16 and Jagdish 2 for 24).

Dr Baljit Kapoor, Principal of PEC, was the chief guest. Dr Kapoor gave away prizes to the winners and runners-up.

Jasjit wins 2 tennis medals

Chandigarh, February 2
Dr Jasjit Singh, Chief Medical Officer, Punjab Raj Bhavan, Chandigarh, won two medals — a silver and a bronze — in the All India Civil Services Tennis Tournament at Hyderabad from January 27 to 31.

He beat Sukumar from Uttaranchal 6-3, 6-1 to win the silver medal. He and J.S. Dhanda to beat the Gujarat pair of I.K. Patil and M.B. Patel in gruelling three sets 6-4, 5-7, 6-2. TNS