Face2News/Chandigarh

A meeting was held in the Department of Cardiology on the occasion of World Heart Day, was  presided over by Professor and Head, Dept of Cardiology, Dr Yash Paul Sharma.

The theme for World Heart Day 2024 is "Use Heart for Action". The theme's meaning is to encourage people to take action to improve their heart health and to motivate leaders to prioritize cardiovascular health. World Heart Day is the largest event on earth for creating awareness in the public regarding cardiovascular disease. World Heart Day was started in the year 1999 by World Heart Federation and since then every 29 September is celebrated all over the globe.

Primordial and primary prevention of cardiovascular risk factors like diabetes, hypertension, smoking, sedentary lifestyle, increased consumption of processed foods, decreased intake of fruits and vegetables, and increased stress at the workplace and home and strategies to decrease those risk factors were discussed. The role of yoga in cardiovascular well-being was also stressed.

The achievements and future prospective of the Department of cardiology were also discussed. Emphasis was given on the management of patients of ACS with comorbidities like sepsis, anemia, Left ventricular dysfunction and cardiogenic shock. The concept of endothelial dysfunction, slow flow, and no flow in coronary artery was also discussed.

The novel strategies given by us for management of patients with ACS with comorbidities and endothelial dysfunction has been adopted across the globe. The innovative and precision-based approach in the management of heart failure and ACS patients was discussed. Now, we routinely observe patients with improved ejection fraction in our subset of heart failure patients.

The department has achieved the least mortality and best survival in patients with severe left ventricular dysfunction and ACS. With the motto of affordable care to all, all patients are getting the best treatment irrespective of their socioeconomic status in our department.

The Department of Cardiology has the most updated infrastructure in this region. We are providing the latest technologies like intravascular ultrasound, optical coherence tomography, orbital atherectomy, intravascular lithotripsy, advanced pediatric interventions, and advanced electrophysiological procedures at affordable cost.

In the last calendar year, we have performed over 9000 coronary angiographies, 6000 angioplasties, and 1000 cardiac implantable devices. In this year till August, we have performed over 6000 coronary angiographies, 3500 angioplasties, and 700 cardiac implantable devices. It was also discussed that there is a rise in number of patients presenting with structural heart diseases and now the therapies like TAVR, TMVR are being given to patients with high surgical risks.

These interventions are associated with both good short term and long term outcomes. We have performed over 100 of TAVI with least mortality and best outcome in the country.

Increase in incidence of CAD among young population aged<40 years [7% of all angioplasties last year] is quite alarming for our country with a very large young population. It may be related to poor dietary habits, increased work stress and sedentary lifestyle. Implementation of “5 days a week elective work with only emergency services on Saturday and Sunday” among youth can lead to improved physical and mental well-being and reduce hypertension, Diabetes, dyslipidemia. It has been observed that countries with 5 day a week working has lesser cardiovascular mortality as compared to 7 days a week.  Our department has been deemed as best in the world by Newsweek in 2023.