SVIMS Director named to Viswanathan Endowed Chair

Tirupati: Sri Venkateswara Institute of Medical Sciences (SVIMS) academic senate has approved the establishment of ‘Chittoor Viswanathan Parvathy Endowed Chair in Healthcare Quality & Patient Safety’ and named its Director-cum-Vice Chancellor Dr TS Ravikumar to the chair. The 39th academic senate meeting of SVIMS held on Saturday took the decision. 

1. The 39th academic senate meeting of SVIMS held on Saturday and took the decision
2. This endowed chair was made possible through Rs 1 crore donation by Dr V Krishnan and family from Australia under Sri Balaji Arogya Varaprasadini Scheme (SBAVPS) and named after the donor’s mother on his request

This endowed chair was made possible through Rs 1 crore donation by Dr V Krishnan and family from Australia under Sri Balaji Arogya Varaprasadini Scheme (SBAVPS) and named after the donor’s mother on his request. The donor requested the endowed chair to be first occupied by Dr Ravikumar, based on his credentials and commitment to quality patient safety. After his tenure, a global search will be initiated to name the successor.

On the occasion, the senate appreciated the ongoing efforts of Dr Ravikumar to improve hospital patient outcomes including mortality, never events and effectiveness of care in many domains. Two days ago, the director unveiled an App for making online appointment/get results (SVIMS App) and launched a Real-time feedback system of patient experience of care, which is also the first of its kind in India. 

While appreciating the generosity of Dr Krishnan and family, Dr Ravikumar expressed his plans to develop the ‘Science of patient safety’ in Indian context and his desire to continue his march towards helping creation of accountable health systems through patient centric systems redesign and human factors engineering. He said that in his view based on the experience and extrapolation, perhaps 4,00,000 to 5,00,000 lives a year could be saved by building safe systems.

The Academic Senate also approved a fellowship in pulmonology called, ‘Late NC Gupta Pulmonary Fellow’ sponsored by another SBAVPS donor Akil Gupta who gave two instalments of Rs 50 lakh each towards this. Dean of SVIMS Prof PVLN Srinivasa Rao, Director of Medical Education Dr N Subba Rao, Dr P Vishnupriya Rao, Dr Narendra Reddy Busireddy, Dr TC Kalawat, Dr M Hanumantha Rao and others participated in the senate meeting.