Ludhiana, April 6
“Case of coronary artery disease (CAD) in India are on the rise in Punjab.” These observations were made by a noted cardiologists at CME of the local physicians, organised by the Escorts Heart Institute and Research Centre, New Delhi at Hotel Park Plaza here on recently. Dr Rajneesh Kapoor, interventional cardiologist discussed at length the new management strategies being used for patients suffering from heart attack and angina. He said acute heart attack could have devastating consequences and many lives could be saved if these patients reach hospital within first few hours of heart attack.
He stressed upon the success of primary angioplasty to save the heart muscles and thus improving the quality of life. Many patients could not benefit from this treatment because of delayed hospitalisation and high costs involved, he added.
Dr Vanita Arora, electrophysiologist and interventional cardiologist, focussed on the new device, biventricular pacemaker, to improve the quality of life in patients with poor heart function, who had recurrent attacks of difficulty in breathing. This device offered them improvement over the new medicines.
She also shared her experience about the implantable cardioverter defibrillator which prevented sudden cardiac death in the patients with malignant ventricular arrhythmia (fast heartbeats). Dr Arora said that there was a need for a national health insurance system to help such patients in
view of expensive treatment. The chairpersons of the session were Dr L. S. Chawla, former Vice-Chancellor of Baba Farid University of Medical Sciences and Dr S. B. Khurana, former principal of Dayanand Medical College, both of whom were eminent physicians of the city.
