The Hindu : Karnataka / Bangalore News : Easy detection of diseases needed, says Madhavan Nair

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Saturday, Jul 29, 2006

Karnataka

Karnataka - Bangalore

Easy detection of diseases needed, says Madhavan Nair

Staff Reporter

HEART CARE: G. Madhavan Nair (right), Chairman of ISRO, at Narayana Hrudayalaya where a 64-slice CT scanner was commissioned in Bangalore on Friday. With him are (from left) K. Kanaka Rao, Chief Medical Officer, ISRO, Bangalore; Devi Prasad Shetty, C hairman of Narayana Hrudayalaya and Arjun Kalyanpur, CEO of Teleradiology Solutions. — Photo: K. Gopinathan

Bangalore: Innovation has to come into the field of diagnostics. There is need to develop new technologies to make detection of diseases easy and research and development in this area have to be strengthened, Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) Chairman G. Madhavan Nair has said.

He was speaking at the launch of the 64-slice CT scanner at Narayana Hrudayalaya here on Friday.

Mr. Nair said that there was no machine that could be compared with the human heart. "Almost all problems begin with the heart and it is in this context that early detection of heart disease gains importance," he said.

With regard to the partnership between Narayana Hrudayalaya and Teleradiology Solutions that had brought the new technology to the city, Mr. Nair said experts here interpret and advise patients in the U.S. and Europe, which shows that Indians were on par with physicians of those countries.

Telemedicine

Mr. Nair told presspersons that telemedicine had helped make quality healthcare accessible to people in the rural and remote parts of the country. Devi Prasad Shetty, Chairman of Narayana Hrudayalaya, said that operating the 64-slice CT scanner was expensive. "The high-tech scanner will help detect and prevent heart attacks. Each scan costs about Rs. 8,000.

The cost will come down if more scans are done. Narayana Hrudayalaya is ready to invest heavily in equipment that will help detect heart disease without any invasive procedures," he said.

Dr. Shetty said ISRO had supported most of the ventures of the hospital. It had helped in bringing quality healthcare to rural areas, and over 22,000 people had been benefited.

"The telecardiology network is the largest in the world," he said.

Arjun Kalyanpur, chief executive officer of Teleradiology Solutions, said in the new machine, a scan could be done in five seconds. "It is a high resolution, high speed scanner. It is capable of giving accurate images of even the smallest coronary arteries," he said.

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