From Our Correspondent
Guwahati: Assam government has shortlisted another batch of 315 children of the State diagnosed with congenital heart disease and they would be sent to Narayana Hrudayalaya in Bangaluru for specialized treatment that will be paid for by the government.
The children will be sent to Bengaluru for treatment in different batches.
A group of six children from the selected 315 children left for Bangaluru with their guardians for treatment on Saturday.
As per a State Government scheme, children diagnosed with congenital heart disease will be given free treatment, including operation, at Narayana Hrudayalaya, Bangalore.
Assam Government and Narayana Hrudayalaya had signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) to operationalize the project.
The State government launched the special drive for the free treatment of children with congenital heart disease in the year 2010.
Since the special facilities required for surgery and post operative care of these unfortunate children were not fully developed yet in the Medical College Hospitals in the State, it was decided that children with these defects will be identified by a special expert team of doctors by conducting screening camps in Gauhati Medical College Hospital periodically and those children in the need of cardiac surgery will be referred to Narayana Hrudayalaya, Bengaluru and Kolkata for treatment. Accordingly screening camps were held in the month of July 2010, November 2010, October Q2011 and April 2012 at Gauhati Medical College.
A total of 1,648 children attended these camps, out of which 1126 children were selected for surgical treatment. So far 798 children have already been benefited by this scheme.
The remaining children already identified are being sent for treatment over the next six months or so.
The entire expenditure of screening camps, travel expenditure of the patient and one attendant from Guwahati to Bengaluru and Kolkata and back by air, hospitalization, investigation and treatment of these children in Narayana Hrudayalaya, Bengaluru and Kolkata are being borne by the Government of Assam.
Similarly, for adult persons with Coronary Artery Disease (commonly known as heart attacks), who are in the need of surgical treatment in the form of Coronary Artery Bypass Graft operations are also being taken up free of cost by the Government.
As the expertise for these operations were not readily available in the State, qualified and experienced surgeons were brought from Max Hospital, New Delhi in the beginning of the programme and later on from Narayana Hrudayalaya, Bangaluru, and operations were performed in the Department of Cardio-thoracic Surgery, Gauhati Medical College Hospital. So far 108 persons have been benefitted by this programme.
Assam Health Minister Dr Himanta Biswa Sarma said that the State health department is taking steps to set up facilities at Guwahati Medical College Hospital to operate adults diagnosed with congenital heart disease.