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Healing hearts
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Even before Noor Fatima, patients from Pakistan, Bangladesh, and other countries came to the city to get their hearts mended.
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Noor
COLIN JOHN was calling a number in South Africa from the director's chamber in the hospital. The telephone there rang a while before someone at the other end responded. Dr. John said: "We have a setback. She may not live too long. Matinda. What do you have us do? OK, we shall send across the body." He then turned to the Tanzanians next to him and told them he would help organise the embalming. "Do you want a priest?" There was a moment's silence. Dr. John reminisced: "She told me she may not leave Bangalore at all. Just yesterday. Twice."
A visit to any major city hospital will tell you how many foreigners come all the way here for medical consultations and treatment. Not surprisingly quite a few are from Pakistan and Bangladesh. While Noor Fatima caught the imagination of the entire nation, there are others who have been arriving and leaving quietly.
According to Dr. Devi Shetty of the Narayana Hrudayalaya, the hospital has treated some 60 people from Pakistan and a fairly significant number from Bangladesh before Noor. On an average, 30 out of every 100 patients who come here are from other countries, mostly from Bangladesh and Pakistan, some from Africa, mainly Tanzania and Zambia.
At Manipal Hospital, around 250 people come every year from countries such as Bangladesh, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Mauritius, and Tanzania. Most among them (60 to 70 per cent) seek heart care at the Heart Foundation. The hospital has an arrangement with the Mauritian Government on cardiac care, while the patients from Tanzania are referral cases.
Junaid
Wockhardt has been seeing on an average 175 to 225 patients from South Asia, West Asia, and South-East Asia over the last five years. Sixty per cent of them come from South Asia, mostly from Bangladesh, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka.
Mallya Hospital has patients coming in from Bangladesh and Sri Lanka for cardiac care.
Apollo Sagar, just a year old, has currently six international patients being treated for different ailments. They have come from Ireland, England, France, Dubai, and Malaysia. Medical professionals say that patients come from Europe and the United States as well.
Mallya has many patients coming in for gynaecological consultations, while Manipal has people coming in for orthopaedics, kidney, and cadaver transplants. However, a large number come for cardiac care, mostly from the subcontinent.
What brings them to Bangalore? What is it about heart care and Bangalore? Is it because the biggest players in cardiac care in the country are in the city? Narayana Hrudayalaya conducts an average of 300 surgeries a month and the largest number of surgeries on infants in the country. A peek into the children's intensive therapy unit (ITU) reveals ventilators breathing life into newborns, and two, four, and six-month-old babies.
Manipal Hospital conducts an average of 1,200 surgeries a year, while Wockhardt conducts 120 cardiac surgeries and 300 cardiac interventions a month. The hospital is probably best known for angioplasty.
Asked if Bangalore facilities matched those in Europe, the U.S. and South-East Asia, Dr. Devi Shetty ripostes: "We are as good if not better than the West in heart care. We have the best cardiac experts and the latest in technology. We are cost-effective. The number of operations in a month at our own hospital is equal to operations performed by all hospitals put together in Singapore. There is no comparison. Japan and China are of course technologically advanced."
Images that captured a nation's imagination.
He calculates that the average cost of surgery on an infant in the West is $65,000, while in India it works out to $2,000. The average cost of a bypass surgery is Rs. 1 lakh in Bangalore and Rs. 6 lakh in Malaysia. If one flew into India from Malaysia, it would work out to only Rs 1.5 lakh. Even in Delhi or Mumbai, it would cost Rs. 4 lakh to 4.5 lakh.
Rajesh Pande, Senior Manager (Communications), Manipal, and Vishal Bali, Vice-President, Wockhardt, say that Bangalore has the most number of super speciality heart care hospitals in the country. The city also has the latest technology cardiac care. The cathlab, for instance, which costs $1 million, is available at Manipal.
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"We are as good if not better than the West in hear care. We have the best cardiac experts and the latest in technology. We are also cost-effective."
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Moreover, Indian doctors trained in the U.S. and the U.K. have been returning home in the last few years. Dr. Devi Shetty says that remuneration for doctors in India has gone up in the last 10 years even as it has declined in the West. Backed by all these strengths are the high standards in nursing. In short, the city has the right combination of quality, cost, and technology. Almeyava, who took a bus from Dhaka to Kolkata and came to Bangalore by train, has admitted her four-month-old baby, Jashfiya Aliya Alim, at Narayana Hrudayalaya. She had heard about Dr. Shetty from her own doctor and relatives back home, and that the hospital extended concessions. "Medical infrastructure in Bangladesh/Dhaka has to be improved. We cannot go to South-East Asia or the West because we cannot afford it. People told us that the hospital here was as good as any in the world. We have been treated well and we are happy with the facilities."
Her decision was totally uncoloured by tensions across the border and she mentions that 40 per cent of the international patients at the hospital were from Bangladesh.
Qamaruzzaman and Usma have come from Faislabad, Pakistan. They took the Lahore-Delhi bus and flew to Bangalore to admit their three-and-a-half year-old child, Wajahat, to Narayana Hrudayalaya after their doctor recommended Dr. Rajesh Sharma to them. "There are three or four good hospitals in Pakistan. But there is need for infrastructure for complex operations." Mr. Qamaruzzaman was ecstatic when he heard that his child needed to undergo only one surgical procedure, instead of the two that many in Pakistan had told him, and that too in a city so close and affordable. "I am completely confident India has the expertise and technology." What about Indo-Pak mistrust? "Those tensions are political. They do not affect us. People here are looking after us well. And we are very happy with the facilities."
Abdul Lataf from Karachi, who took the Lahore-Delhi bus and thence to Bangalore by train, seems overwhelmed that his 12-year-old brother, Azeez-ur-Rehman, has recovered from surgery. "I am happy with the treatment and the concern doctors here have shown us." A doctor from Karachi's Cardio-Vascular Institute recommended the case. Surgery in Pakistan would have cost him Rs. 8 lakh, and in Europe, Rs. 40 lakh. It cost him a mere Rs. 2 lakh here. He too says medical facilities for complex operations need to be upgraded in his country, especially cardiac procedures, where doctors and technology are in short supply. "After Noor, many people want to come to India instead of going to Europe. I feel sad India and Pakistan fight over Kashmir. We love the people here. My stay has been completely comfortable."
The Pakistani and Bangladeshi families are very satisfied with the accommodation and canteen fare, and more than happy with the small mosque within the premises of Narayana Hrudayalaya where they can pray.
As I leave, I come across a group of Zambians. One of the patients, Teria Dama, is a nurse who first went to Johannesburg, South Africa, only to find out she would not be able to afford the surgery. The doctors there suggested she come to India. She has come to Narayana Hrudayalaya with four others, all sponsored by the Zambian Government. Interestingly, their flight and medical expenses here put together cost less than in just surgery in Johannesburg.
Now, if only surgery could repair broken hearts across the subcontinent...
PRASHANTH G.N.
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