19 December 2004	Sunday	06 Ziqa'ad 1425

KARACHI, Dec 18: Around 350 to 400 million people are documented to be suffering from Hepatitis-B in the world with Pakistan documenting Hepatitis-B prevalence of two to seven per cent making it a serious cause of concern.

This was stated by Dr Richard Marley, renowned hematologist heading the Liver Unit at St Barholomew's and Royal London Hospitals of the UK, here on Saturday. He was delivering the Prof M.U. Islam Memorial Lecture on "Optimizing Treatment of Chronic HBV Infection" as part of the ongoing annual symposium of Dow University of Health Sciences with the theme "Care of community - marching towards excellence".

Dr Marley referred to the studies that documented 300 to 400 million people infected with HBV across the globe with the highest prevalence of the disease documented in developing countries, particularly the Far Eastern countries where it was estimated around eight per cent.

He mentioned that liver cancer was the fifth most common cancer in the world with majority of cases occurring in the developing countries. In the light of the very information, he talked about methods of identifying and diagnosing the disease in its earlier stages and provided a comprehensive and up-to-date coverage of treatment procedures being followed in the West.

At present, he said, treatment for Hepatitis-B was expensive and its success was not always ensured.

Following the maxim 'Prevention is better than cure', the senior medical professional emphasized the importance of vaccination as a simple and relatively inexpensive way to check the prevalence. In this regard, he referred to the dramatic reduction in Hepatitis-B cancer and mortality in Taiwan where vaccination had been implemented for some time.

Senior expert in arthroscopic surgery, Dr Anant Joshi from India presented the state of lecture on "Past, Present and Future of Arthroscopy". The surgeon on Friday had also conducted a live arthroscopic surgery before a team of doctors and gave video presentation as well.

Prof M. Shafi Quraishi presented the state-of-art lecture on "Polypoidal Lesions of the Colon". He spoke on the advantages of endoscopic removal of growths in the colon which was part of the gastro-intestinal tract. It was said that endoscopic removal was a non-invasive out patient procedure which was less expensive.

Prof M.M. Yaqoob from Royal London Hospital delivered a state-of-art presentation on "Preventive strategies for chronic renal failure". The speaker, a graduate of Dow Medical College, is internationally known for his work in the field of nephrology.

Chronic renal failure was described as a silent killer since it does not present any symptoms in its early stages. This, he maintained, led to incidence of disease being higher than awareness about it.

Using figures from various studies, he estimated that the number of patients in Pakistan who might be requiring dialysis at the moment would be approximately 50,000. With annual cost putting one patient on dialysis being Rs300,000, the total annual bill of treating all who require dialysis would amount to Rs15 billion.

Dr Arif Hasan, renowned heart surgeon currently working in the UK, made his presentation on heart transplantation. His lecture included the successful heart transplant operation that he had carried out on a six-month-old baby girl. He also displayed photograph of the recipient receiving a birthday card from Prime Minister Tony Blair on her 18th birthday.

Later, a special session of the symposium on "Clinical Research and Development Challenges and Opportunities in Pakistan" was held in the premises of Sindh Medical College. -APP