A true Story

There was this man from Pondicherry, India, aged 57 years. He was an extremely lovable person, helpful to everyone and very religious. He had a high profile job, was financially stable and socially well settled. He was a non-smoker, consumed alcohol occasionally and enjoyed good food. He was concerned about his health and went for regular check-ups. He was neither a diabetic nor a hypertensive, had normal cholesterol levels and ECG/TMT were normal. In short he was ‘risk-free’ from heart disease.

He was happy and healthy. At least, that was what he thought….. until one day on his 30th wedding anniversary he had a massive heart attack and did not live to see another day. That man was … my father and today happens to be his birthday.

My father became just another ‘heart disease’ statistic!

He was one of the 50 million Indians who suffer from Coronary Heart Disease 

He belonged to 50% of those for whom heart attack is the first symptom of heart disease

He belonged to 50% of those having heart attack, who die during the first attack.

What had happened? What went wrong? How could a person have normal BP and a normal ECG and then have a massive heart attack later? Had the doctors been negligent? Did they make a mistake while reading the ECG? Or was the ECG itself wrong?

The answers to these questions are not very simple. The conventional diagnostic techniques like ECG, TMT, which failed to detect his heart disease have their own limitations and newer diagnostic procedures are either not available or nor utilized adequately.

My father had to wait for a heart attack to know that he had heart disease, but it was too late.

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The above writing is an excerpt from the ‘Welcome address’ made during the inaugural ceremony of Safe Health Heart Centre on his birthday at Hotel Green Park Hyderabad.  Safe Health focuses on Preventive Cardiology. Safe Health has been instrumental in making more than 4000 people and their families happier. 

Thank you Dad ... but I wish you were around!