PUDUCHERRY: The proposed catheterisation laboratory in the Government General Hospital here will start functioning by the end of this month.

The components of the cath lab had already arrived and they were being assembled. The trial run was expected to start by the second week of January, Dr Dilip Kumar Baliga, Director, Health and Family Welfare told The Hindu .

He said the opening of the catheterisation lab would help heart patients in the Union Territory get treatment free of cost. The sophisticated equipment would cost the exchequer Rs 4.67 crore, he added. The cath lab was a specialised radiological suite, where cardio catheterisation was performed. A cardiac-cath or angiogram was a procedure that identifies possible problems in the heart or arteries, he said.

It would help detect cardiac problems and help perform correction treatments like angioplasty, stenting and close septal defects. Nine staff from the Government Hospital, including doctors, nurses and lab assistants were undergoing training at a private hospital in Chennai, Dr Baliga added.

He said the Government also proposed to undertake cardio-thoracic surgeries once the cath lab was operational and the construction of the new block was over.

Some of the specialty departments such as neurosurgery, nephrology and the existing pharmacy store would also be shifted to the new block, which was coming up on the hospital premises. The new block was expected to be ready in another six months, Dr Baliga said.

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