Tamil Nadu - Chennai   

More beds for General Hospital cardiac ward

Staff Reporter

CHENNAI : The Department of Cardio Thoracic Surgery at Government General Hospital has received 50 more beds, bringing its bed strength to 250.

A ward occupied by the Orthopaedics department was handed over to help the department clear the "backlog" of patients in the department. The department annually performs more than 400 free heart surgeries (which cost at least Rs. 2 lakh each in corporate hospitals) requiring several days' stay at the hospital.

In the city, GH performs the maximum number of valve replacement surgeries, says K. Harshavardhan, head of the department.

The hospital, which performed its first heart surgery in 1964, does 450 valve replacement surgeries a year now, which accounts for 80 per cent of the department's work. Though most congenital heart defects can be treated if detected early many people go to the doctors only when their condition turns serious. Early screening helps to plan surgeries before a child attains the "school going age." At the GH screening for heart problems, which could cost Rs. 1,000 in a private institution, is done for free.

Because of better technology and rising cost of treatment, the poor seek out the GH for treatment. It is to cater for them that the hospital has increased the bed strength of the Cardio-thoracic department.

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