Arunkumar Arasappa
Sri Manakula Vinayagar Medical College and Hospital, India
Title: Establishing a cardiac programme in rural or semiurban places - Feasible or not?
Biography
Biography: Arunkumar Arasappa
Abstract
To discuss the feasibility of starting and establishing a superspecialty department like cardiothoracic surgery in rural and semi-urban centers is a herculean task. We planned to setup a pilot project on how to start a superspecialty department in Rural and semiurban places and also to do open heart surgical procedures at an affordable cost. We discussed our plan with a medical college hospital in our locality and they helped us to start this within their premises with available infrastructure. We closely followed up the inpatient crowd of the hospital and secured cases from all fields of medicine and especially from cardiology department. We managed to maintain a registry of cases and categorized patients based on their symptoms and who needed surgery. Our next task of building the infrastructure was aimed and we procured materials necessary to start this program which included setting up of operation theatre, CT ICU and postoperative wards. Our other task of recruiting staffs for caring the patients was breathtaking and was managed successfully. After establishing this we started our first open heart procedure on April 2016 and continued from thereon. Today, we had crossed more than 90 open heart surgeries apart from vascular and thoracic surgeries. We have now established a center which can perform all cardiac surgery programs that are done at any standard hospitals or medical colleges in major cities. Today we proudly say that the task is well started and could be achieved with the help of a supporting team of dedicated doctors and paramedical staffs and equally supported with the necessary infrastructure by the hospital to cater the underprivileged people with the support of various schemes and insurance assistance.