KARACHI, Dec 8: People living in the northern part of city, suffering from serious heart diseases, seek an early commencement of cardiac or open heart surgery facility at the Karachi Institute of Heart Disease.

The institute, inaugurated 18 months ago in Gulberg Town, offers various cardiac diagnostic and therapeutic modalities, including angiography, angioplasty, thallium scanning, ETT, Echo Doppler and CCU. The institute also started indoor medication facilities besides extending round-the-clock emergency service.

A patient from North Nazimabad at the institute said the cardiac facility run by the city government was a great source of relief to the population of different towns adjacent to the hospital located in Block-16 of Federal B Area.

However, he said, patients would be benefited further if the institute of heart diseases extended cardiac surgery facility.

“Once a patient is diagnosed and advised for open heart surgery by doctors at the KIHD, he has to wait for months for the process supposed to be carried out at the National Institute of Cardiovascular Diseases,” said another patient.

The NICVD was planned for four million citizens in 1965. The population has increased to 15 million and the NICVD is overworked and sometimes it has to compromise on patient’s care in view of its limitations, said a senior doctor.

Health circles claim that more than six patients are brought dead everyday as they cannot reach the NICVD in time as it is situated in the southern corner of the city.

A senior doctor said patients load in OPDs of the NICVD had decreased considerably after the commencement of the KIHD.

For residents of North Karachi, Gulberg, Liaquatabad, Gulshan-i-Iqbal, Gaddap, North Nazimabad, New Karachi, SITE, Baldia and Orangi towns, it is unwise to take along any heart stroke patient miles away to the major cardiac hospital in short span of time. Sometimes, great damage to heart is done while the patients are on way to hospital without any medication.

At present, the KIHD has 20-bed emergency, 20-bed coronary care unit, in addition to different testing units. During the last 17 months, over one lac patients have been examined in the OPD, while 1,417 ETTs were performed during the same period. Over 10,200 patients have been managed in the emergency of the institute.

KIHD Deputy Executive Director Dr Sirajul Haq Tariq said the authorities were well aware of the peoples’ plight and efforts were being made to have a surgery setup functional at the earliest.

On provisional basis, a cardiac surgery facility with four to five beds capacity and an operation theatre was likely to be made operational in the existing building of the institute in three to four months, he added.

He said the existing hospital of KIHD launched in the first phase surely needed upgradation and capacity enhancement in view of manifolds increase in population.

He said the government allocated Rs400 million for construction of a new four-storey building within the existing premises of KIHD, where facilities for open heart adult and infant surgeries would be made available in three to four years. This would be the city’s first paediatric cardiology facility in the public sector, Dr Haq said.

The project would be formally kicked off in a couple of days. With provision of angioplasty and open heart surgery, the centre would facilitate people to avail cardiac healthcare facilities in their locality.