The Hindu : Tamil Nadu / Chennai News : American in city for knee surgery

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Monday, Mar 06, 2006

Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu - Chennai

American in city for knee surgery

Staff Reporter

James Spark is 59-year-old mountaineer

CHENNAI: When grave injuries to his knee and shoulder cast a cloud over his passion for mountaineering, James Spark logged onto the Web from his U.S. home and zeroed in on treatment offered by a Chennai hospital.

The 59-year-old mountaineer, whose conquests include scaling the Mount Everest and peaks in Colorado, Ecuador and Peru, is now recuperating at the Venkataseshwara Hospital after an anterior cruciate ligament reconstruction operation and an arthroscopic surgery for a torn tendon in his left shoulder.

Though the daredevil wants to resume his passion, orthopaedic surgeon A. K. Venkatachalam has advised Mr. Spark to perform knee and shoulder exercises for six to nine months. "The exorbitant costs of such surgeries in U.S. hospitals prompted me to look elsewhere," Mr. Spark said. It costs around 18,000 USD (Rs. 7 lakh) for arthroscopic rotator cuff surgery and USD 25,000 (Rs. 11 lakh) for reconstruction surgery on the knee. Mr. Spark zeroed in on Chennai for the quality and affordability of healthcare offered in this Southern Indian city.

Each surgery cost Mr. Spark around Rs. 1.5 lakh. He will return to the U.S. in three weeks' time.

Thillai Vallal, managing director of the hospital, said the increase in overseas patients reaffirmed Chennai's status as a hub of medical tourism.

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