The Hindu : Tamil Nadu / Chennai News : Creating awareness of muscular dystrophy

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, Sep 06, 2006

Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu - Chennai

Creating awareness of muscular dystrophy

Special Correspondent

Parents looking for information will findwww.mdaindia.orguseful

CHENNAI: Lack of a protein can be fatal for a child, if the protein is dystrophin. When the protein is absent, children, mostly boys, have progressive wasting of skeletal muscles. The resultant condition, Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy (DMD), leads to death. In an effort to help parents, children and communities cope with the problem, the Muscular Dystrophy Association of India and Sundaram Medical Foundation, part of the Cooperative International Neuromuscular Research Group (CINRG), have decided to launch a website www.mdaindia.org.

The site will aid in creating awareness of the condition and save time and cost for patients and their families, says V. Viswanathan, paediatric neurologist. While the present focus is on DMD, it will incorporate about 70 variants of muscular dystrophy eventually.

Parents can find information on the disease, current research and treatment details, activities across the globe, CINRG schedules, help notes, members and volunteers list and activities for children.

Dr. Viswanathan adds that the site would also kick-start the process of creating a national task force for public awareness, recommendations of health care reforms and rehabilitation measures.

"Perusing the needs, opportunities and recommendation from pioneers in this field, we also look forward to creating a National Referral Centre for Neuromuscular diseases in the near future. We believe that the phased effort will certainly help to bring down the incidence of such diseases with effective clinical, diagnostic, and counselling and outreach programmes," he says.

The website will be launched at a fun event for children at Mayajaal on East Coast Road on Wednesday.

As young ones enjoy games and contests organised specially for them, their parents can attend sessions on clinical aspects, physiotherapy, diagnostics and nutrition in handling muscular dystrophy.

Printer friendly page
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Tamil Nadu