The Hindu : Tamil Nadu / Chennai News : Awareness of complicated ailments lacking: Vayalar Ravi

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Sunday, Jun 25, 2006

Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu - Chennai

Awareness of complicated ailments lacking: Vayalar Ravi

Staff Reporter

`Private, government hospitals should coordinate'

CHENNAI: Union Minister for Overseas Indian Affairs Vayalar Ravi on Saturday called for a closer coordination between private and government hospitals, especially in child health issues.

Speaking at the Madras Medical Mission hospital in Mogappair after dedicating a 64-slice Computer Tomography (CT) equipment at the hospital's scan centre, Mr. Ravi said there was a lack of awareness about complicated ailments. Referring to a statistic that nearly 1 per cent of newborns suffer from congenital cardiac problems, he said that private hospitals could pitch in to create awareness about the issue.

State Health Minister K.K.S.S.R. Ramachandran said the State government would extend all support to private initiatives to create awareness about less known health conditions.

According to a newsletter circulated by Madras Medical Mission, the new 64-slice CT scanner was a considerable improvement over the single slice spiral CT scanner introduced in 1990 and the multi-slice (4-8-10 and 16 slice) scanners that were the standard from 1998 to 2001. Apart from improved quality of diagnosis, especially in evaluating vascular structure, the Rs.4-crore-equipment also reduces the scan time to just a few seconds.

The Coronary CT Angiography scans made by the 64-slice CT scanner have a spatial resolution of less than 0.4 millimetres in x, y and z planes, facilitating sharp images. The equipment has been dedicated to be a part of the M.A. Abraham Memorial Scan Centre.

The Madras Medical Mission is also conducting a three-day-course on Advanced Cardiovascular Therapeutics for medical practitioners.

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