Visakhapatnam: STEMI project to reduce premature cardiac deaths

 Visakhapatnam: District collector A Mallikarjuna said young people are being more prone to heart attacks after Covid-19 pandemic and they are experiencing life threatening problems.

Inaugurating Andhra Pradesh ST-Elevation Myocardial Infarction (STEMI) project training programme here on Monday, the collector said the state government has started the project to minimise such premature deaths.

The district collector said the training programme would be continued till August 19. As part of the training, doctors, nurses and paramedical staff working in community health centres and primary health centres would be trained for a period of 10 days. People can be saved from heart attacks and cardiac arrest deaths would be reduced through the programme, he added.

In remote areas and semi-urban areas, doctors are being trained to detect heart attacks by conducting an ECG and suggest treatment by passing the information to a cardiologist, Mallikarjuna said. Based on their report, the CHC and PHC doctors would prescribe suitable medicines to the patients, he added.

Further, the district collector said that such projects already exist in Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Assam, Jharkhand, Maharashtra and Goa. Chief Minister Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy launched the scheme to stop deaths due to heart attacks from those residing far from the hospitals, he said.

Cardiology professors, associate professors, assistant professors, cardiology department experts of Andhra Medical College will provide training to the medical staff.

Andhra Medical College principal Dr G Butchi Raju, KGH superintendent Dr P Sivananda, KGH deputy superintendent Padmaja, department of cardiology doctors and staff were present.