Kerala - Kochi   

A finger on the pulse of the people

Padma Shri awardeeDr. Philip Augustine

KOCHI: Starting a practice in a remote town in spite of all the academic top grades was not exactly a dream launch pad for Dr. Philip Augustine.

But then, people are the same everywhere. They need to go to a doctor when they are sick, wherever they are.

This was perhaps one of the reasons why Dr. Augustine stayed back in the small township of Koothatukulam even after he passed out with a gold medal in MD (internal medicine) from the All India Institute of Medical Sciences in 1975 and had many offers to go places.

The Padma Shri award that came his way recently is a recognition of his contribution to clinical and medical research, for which Dr. Augustine has already received many awards and honours.

His untiring zeal and dedication saw the expansion of the 75-bed Deva Mata Hospital to a 350-bed facility with all basic amenities needed to cater to the medical needs of the 50,000 people in the area. The hospital soon became a referral centre for major medical problems. “My stint as a physician there gave me an insight into the magnitude of gastrointestinal diseases in Kerala”, said Dr. Augustine. This led him to go in for specialisation in gastroenterology. “My teacher at Kottayam Medical College Dr. P. J. Geevarghese was the first person to make me interested in the subject with his observations on Kerala pancreatitis”, said the Kaduthuruthy-born doctor.

Dr. Augustine was the first to report as many as 26 cases of Crohn's disease (ulcer in the digestive tract that has no established reason for origin) in the country in 1995 at the national conference of the Indian Society of Gastroenterology. This was after he joined the PVS Memorial Hospital in Kochi after his clinical and research work outgrew the small town.

Though, it took top gastroenterologists to acknowledge this at the time, it is now acknowledged that the State has the highest incidence of the disease. Many national and international gastroenterologists have come to him for advanced training in gastrointestinal endoscopy as Dr. Augustine, had over the 10 years, established a pioneering position in advanced therapeutic endoscopic procedures.

The small town of Koothattukulam had earlier found a place in the gastroenterology world literature with his publications on Tropical Pancreatitis – an enigmatic medical problem with the highest world incidence in Kerala. His team was also the first to report the occurrence in the country of the disease ‘Recurrent Pyogenic Cholangites' or ‘Oriental Cholangiopathy', which is a formation of stone in the bile duct. It was the initiative of Dr. Augustine that led to the setting up of Lakeshore Hospital with 130 doctors pitching in as stakeholders in the new venture as a public limited company in 2005. It is now one of the few hospitals that have been certified by the National Accreditation Board for Hospitals and Healthcare providers.

“We have affordable medical care here”, said Dr. Augustine, who was among the pioneers to promote the concept of medical tourism as the chairman of the healthcare sub-committee of the Confederation of Indian Industry (Kerala).

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

Stories in this Section

Tweeters get together for a cause
Ayurveda expo showcases new products
Call to join in Earth Hour observance
Rationalists to fight revival of rituals
Global Ayurveda Summit focusses on accreditation issues
Three villages in Ernakulam unbanked
Meeting
A finger on the pulse of the people
Distress alert beacon for fishermen
SmartCity promoters blame government
Vegetable prices touch new high as dry spell continues
In Kochi Today

Copyright © 2010, The Hindu. Republication or redissemination of the contents of this screen are expressly prohibited without the written consent of The Hindu