Posts

Why India is a preferred health destination for the world ?

/0 Comments/in /by

Medical tourism is a growing sector in India. In October 2015, India’s medical tourism sector was estimated to be worth US$3 billion. It is projected to grow to $7–8 billion by 2020. According to the Confederation of Indian Industries (CII), the primary reason that attracts medical value travel to India is cost-effectiveness, and treatment from accredited facilities at par with developed countries at much lower cost. The Medical Tourism Market Report: 2015 found that India was “one of the lowest cost and highest quality of all medical tourism destinations, it offers wide variety of procedures at about one-tenth the cost of similar procedures in the United States. 

Foreign patients travelling to India to seek medical treatment in 2012, 2013 and 2014 numbered 171,021, 236,898, and 184,298 respectively. Traditionally, the United States and the United Kingdom have been the largest source countries for medical tourism to India. However, according to a CII-Grant Thornton report released in October 2015, Bangladeshis and Afghans accounted for 34% of foreign patients, the maximum share, primarily due to their close proximity with India and poor healthcare infrastructure. Russia and the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) accounted for 30% share of foreign medical tourist arrivals. Other major sources of patients include Africa and the Middle East, particularly the Persian Gulf countries. In 2015, India became the top destination for Russians seeking medical treatment. Chennai, Jalandhar, Kolkata, Mumbai, Hyderabad and the National Capital Region received the highest number of foreign patients primarily from South Eastern countries.

Why India is best for Health needs ? 

Cost

Most estimates found that treatment costs in India start at around one-tenth of the price of comparable treatment in the United States or the United Kingdom. The most popular treatments sought in India by medical tourists are alternative medicine, bone-marrow transplant, cardiac bypass, eye surgery and hip replacement. India is known in particular for heart surgery, hip resurfacing and other areas of advanced medicine.

Quality of care

India has 28 JCI accredited hospitals. However, for a patient traveling to India, it is important to find the optimal Doctor-Hospital combination. After the patient has been treated, the patient has the option of either recuperating in the hospital or at a paid accommodation nearby. Many hospitals also give the option of continuing the treatment through telemedicine.

The city of Chennai has been termed “India’s health capital”. Multi- and super-specialty hospitals across the city bring in an estimated 150 international patients every day. Chennai attracts about 45 percent of health tourists from abroad arriving in the country and 30 to 40 percent of domestic health tourists. Factors behind the tourists inflow in the city include low costs, little to no waiting period, and facilities offered at the specialty hospitals in the city.[9] The city has an estimated 12,500 hospital beds, of which only half is used by the city’s population with the rest being shared by patients from other states of the country and foreigners. Dental clinics have attracted dental care tourism to Chennai. 

Ease of travel

The government has removed visa restrictions on tourist visas that required a two-month gap between consecutive visits for people from Gulf countries which is likely to boost medical tourism. A visa-on-arrival scheme for tourists from select countries has been instituted which allows foreign nationals to stay in India for 30 days for medical reasons. 

Language

Despite India’s diversity of languages, English is an official language and is widely spoken. In Noida, which is fast emerging as a hotspot for medical tourism, a number of hospitals have hired language translators to make patients from Balkan and African countries feel more comfortable while at the same time helping in the facilitation of their treatment. 

Medisensehealth.com has been a front runner in providing Online Medical Opinion, Treatment Options & logistical support for international patients. This platform is a one-stop-shop for all the health needs of the patients. This platform has a tie-up with all the major Hospitals in India viz. Fortis, Apollo, Manipal and many more depending on the treatment sought by the patients. Following are the benefits for patients availing the healthcare facilities in India.

1. Online medical Opinion at the comfort of patient’s home. Just fill the form at www.medisensehealth.com/second-opinion 

2. Patients can choose the specialists / hospitals or ask Medisense for recommendations.

3. Patients receive treatment options both in allopathic and Ayurvedic health streams.

4. Depending on the treatment options, cost details, treating doctor’s details will be sent to the patient.

5. Patients get a choice to speak to the consultant and his team through skype or phone.

6. If the patient decides to visit India, then medical Visa will be processed. Travel/accommodation can be arranged by the patients or else ask our coordinators to arrange for the same. 

7. Post treatment in India, if patients wants to recuperate at a holiday destination like Goa, Agra or any area interest, just let our travel team know, they shall arrange for the same. 

8. Post treatment support back in the home country of the patient will also be arranged by medisense.

Here is a cost comparison between India and UK / UK for major procedures www.medisensehealth.com/internatinal-patients

We are the single point of contact for all our international patients, while you are in India.  

We wish you a healthy Life. 

Source for statistics : wikipedia

Source for image : Unknown

iMedWorks Ask Platform Links below:

1. Get a Medical Second Opinion
2. Search doctors and Request Appointment

One in 3 stent implants in India is possibly unnecessary

/0 Comments/in /by

Several senior cardiologists in India have raised concern over rise in the cases of unnecessary implant of stents in India. They say if an audit of stent implant cases was done, over a third of the elective procedures could turn out to be needless.

A few years ago in the US, which has better monitoring and oversight of medical procedures than India, studies had found that only half the non-emergency cardiac stenting procedures were appropriate. Several cardiologists and hospitals were forced to cough up millions of dollars in penalties for unnecessary stenting. Stent companies too paid heavy penalties to settle charges of giving kickbacks to doctors.

There is no regulation of hospitals in India, especially in the private sector where a majority of urban Indians seek healthcare. “At least 25-30% of the stenting done in this country is inappropriate. There are cases of stents being used in absolutely normal patients. External audit of every cath lab and all cardiac procedures is urgently needed. Every state government ought to have doctors with calibre and integrity comprising an audit committee. And doctors caught doing inappropriate stenting ought to be jailed for fraud to set an example,” said Dr T S Kler, head of the department of cardiology in Fortis Escorts Heart Institute.

In 2007 a study in the US that tracked patients over five years showed that in people with stable coronary artery disease, stents were no better than drug therapy. Until this finding, doctors had claimed that stenting in such cases showed excellent results.

In India, there are hospitals that boast of conducting up to 25,000 angioplasties a year and several cardiologists are too close to stent makers and suppliers for comfort. In the absence of any monitoring or oversight, patients in India have no protection from unnecessary use of stent.

“I agree that a significant percentage of angioplasties are inappropriate. I think the Cardiology Society of India should bring out guidelines and create a mechanism to audit themselves rather than giving a chance for an external body to be created. Such an audit is needed as society has lost trust in doctors because of such inappropriate use,” says Dr Devi Shetty, chairman of Narayana Health.

In 2009, an expert panel of cardiologists in the US published criteria for appropriate use of stents. A study preceding the publication looked at 2.7 million stenting procedures in 766 hospitals. It showed that inappropriate stenting in non-acute cases, fell from 25% in 2009 to 13% by 2014. Equally significantly, the total number of stenting in non-acute cases fell by about a third. As a result, the total number of cases of inappropriate stenting fell from 21,000 to just 8,000.

While there is broad consensus among cardiologists that stents can save the life of a patient with symptoms of heart attack, the decision to use stents on an elective basis is far more complicated. With the National Pharmaceutical Pricing Authority revealing that hospitals make the highest profit on stents, it seems obvious why hospitals are not pushing for audits to curb inappropriate use.

Source: http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/one-in-3-stent-implants-in-india-is-possibly-unnecessary/articleshow/57071863.cms

Image source: https://www.drbillsukala.com.au/exercise/exercise-after-angioplasty-stent/

iMedWorks Ask Platform Links below:

1. Get a Medical Second Opinion
2. Search doctors and Request Appointment

Costs for generic hepatitis C drugs available in India would be paid back in 5 to 10 years

/0 Comments/in /by

Use of the generic versions of directly-acting antiviral (DAA) drugs that are available in India to treat hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection is not only cost effective but actually saves lifetime costs for treating infected patients in that country. A report from an international research team appears in the open-access journal PLOS ONE and describes finding that the upfront costs of DAA are offset by the avoidance of costs incurred to treat late-stage disease.

“More than 9 million people are infected with HCV in India, and more than 70 million worldwide,” says Jagpreet Chhatwal, PhD, of the Institute for Technology Assessment at Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH), senior and corresponding author of the paper. “These persons are at risk of developing serious conditions such as cirrhosis and liver cancer, which can be fatal. However, only a fraction of them have been treated with these drugs so far.”

First introduced in 2011, DAAs such as sofosbuvir (Sovaldi) and ledipasvir (which is combined with sofosbuvir in Harvoni) have proven to be remarkably successful in the battle against HCV infection, with cure rates exceeding 95 percent. In developed countries, treatment with DAAs is very expensive — reaching nearly $65,000 in the U.S. — although it meets standards for cost effectiveness. In those countries the advent of these drugs has drastically changed the landscape of HCV infection. But other countries have lagged behind in their use.

Through agreements with the pharmaceutical companies that developed these drugs, generic drug manufacturers in India are now able to produce versions that cost as little as $300 for the entire duration of treatment. But the absence of data on the cost effectiveness of these drugs in that country and low budgets for HCV treatment have meant that only a small proportion of people needing these drugs have received them.

The research team — including investigators from Sanjay Gandhi Postgraduate Institute of Medical Sciences in Lucknow, India, and the World Health Organization — used a mathematical model to compare the outcomes of DAA treatment with those of no DAA treatment based on profiles of 30 hypothetical patients with characteristics typical of Indian patients with HCV infection. Factors incorporated into the model included the natural history of HCV disease, the costs of DAA administration, the costs of treating the adverse outcomes of HCV disease, and quality of life of individuals infected with HCV.

The model indicated that, compared with no DAA treatment, use of the generic drugs in HCV-infected Indian patients would increase life expectancy by more than eight years while reducing lifetime health care costs by more than $1,300 per person. Payback for the upfront costs of DAA drugs would be achieved in an overall average of less than 10 years — under 5 years for patients at advanced stages of HCV disease and almost 12 years if treatment begins at earlier stages. Even though there was wide variation in the factors — such as patient age, disease stage, and viral genotype — input to the model, results always indicated that generic DAA treatment reduced lifetime costs.

“Our hypothesis was that treatment would be cost saving, given the low drug costs in India. However, we were pleasantly surprised to find that the full payback was achieved so soon after treatment,” says Chhatwal, who is an assistant professor of Radiology at Harvard Medical School. “Our finding that treatment pays back its initial costs makes a very strong statement — that investment in HCV screening and treatment should be a priority for public health agencies in India and other countries where generic DAAs are available. It could also be argued that generic DAAs should be made available in other low- and middle-income countries where HCV infection is common and budgets for treatment limited.”

Lead author Rakesh Aggarwal, MD, DM, of the Department of Gastroenterology at Sanjay Gandhi Postgraduate Institute of Medical Sciences (SGPGIMS), a WHO Collaborating Center on Viral Hepatitis, says, “This is a win-win situation for the low- and low-middle-income countries where the generic DAAs can be sold. If these countries spend money on HCV treatment today, they will recoup it in the form of reduced health care expenditure within less than one decade. There is hardly any other health care intervention with such good return. Our results should show political leaders in those countries that they have a wonderful opportunity to make a difference for their constituents.”

Story Source:Materials provided by Massachusetts General Hospital.

URL: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2017/05/170517184519.htm

Zika virus reaches India, WHO confirms 3 cases in Ahmedabad

/0 Comments/in /by

Zika virus disease has reached India, with the World Health Organisation (WHO) confirming first three cases in Gujarat’s Ahmedabad.

The WHO endorsed the findings of laboratory tests conducted in the country, saying all three cases, including that of a pregnant woman, were reported from Bapunagar area of the city.

The disease is spread by daytime-active Aedes mosquitoes and an infection during pregnancy can cause birth defects in newborns known as microcephaly — a condition in which babies’ head is abnormally small. It is characterised by brain damage and may cause other defects like blindness, deafness, and even seizures.

“The Ministry of Health and Family Welfare – Government of India (MoHFW) reported three laboratory-confirmed cases of Zika virus disease in Bapunagar area, Ahmedabad District, Gujarat State, India,” the global health body said in a statement.

India has strengthened its surveillance system in the past few years to detect and contain new infections. Only three Zika cases have been detected in around 50,000 tested so far, a senior Health Ministry official said.

According to the WHO statement, routine surveillance detected a laboratory-confirmed case of Zika virus disease through RT-PCR test at B J Medical College in Ahmedabad.

This was further confirmed at the national reference laboratory at the National Institute of Virology (NIV) in Pune on 4 January this year. The WHO said two additional cases were then identified through the Acute Febrile Illness (AFI) and the Antenatal clinic (ANC) surveillance.

Between 10-16 February in 2016, a total 93 blood samples were collected at BJ Medical College (BJMC) out of which one sample from a 64-year-old male had tested positive for Zika virus.

“This was first Zika positive case reported through AFI surveillance from Gujarat,” the statement said. Also, a 34-year-old woman delivered a baby at BJMC on 9 November and during her stay in the hospital she developed a low-grade fever after delivery.

The woman had no history of fever during pregnancy and had no history of travel for three months. A sample from the patient was referred to the Viral Research and Diagnostic Laboratory (VRDL) for dengue testing and was found to be positive for the virus.

“She was discharged after one week (on 16 November, 2016). The sample was re-confirmed as Zika virus positive at NIV,” the statement said.

Besides, a 22-year-old pregnant woman in her 37th week of pregnancy was tested positive for Zika virus disease at the same hospital.

As per the WHO statement, immediately after the cases were reported, the Health ministry had shared the national guidelines and action plan on Zika virus disease have been shared with the states to prevent an outbreak of the disease and containment of spread in case of any outbreak.

It also constituted an inter-ministerial task force. A technical group tasked to monitor emerging and re-emerging diseases regularly reviewed the global situation on Zika virus disease.

All the international airports and ports have displayed information for travellers on Zika virus disease while the airport health officers along with airport organisations, the National Centre for Disease Control and the National Vector Borne Disease Control Programme are monitoring appropriate vector control measures in airport premises.

In addition to NIV and NCDC in Delhi, 25 laboratories have also been strengthened by Indian Council of Medical Research for laboratory diagnosis, while three entomological laboratories are conducting Zika virus testing on mosquito samples.

“The Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) has tested 34,233 human samples and 12,647 mosquito samples for the presence of Zika virus. Among those, close to 500 mosquitoes samples were collected from Bapunagar area, Ahmedabad district, in Gujarat, and were found negative for Zika.

“The Rashtriya Bal Swasthya Karyakram (RBSK) is monitoring microcephaly from 55 sentinel sites. As of now, no increase in number of cases or clustering of microcephaly has been reported from these centers,” the WHO said.

While coming out with the report, the WHO said it assumes significance as it describes the first cases of Zika virus infections and provides evidence on its circulation in India.

“These findings suggest low level transmission of Zika virus and new cases may occur in the future,” it said, while stressing on strengthening surveillance to better characterise the intensity of the viral circulation and geographical spread and monitor Zika virus related complications.

“Zika virus is known to be circulating in South East Asia Region and these findings do not change the global risk assessment. WHO encourages member states to report similar findings to better understand the global epidemiology of Zika virus,” the statement said.

The risk of further spread of Zika virus to areas where the competent vectors, the aedes mosquitoes, are present is significant given the wide geographical distribution of these mosquitoes in various regions of the world.

Those infected with the virus may have mild fever, skin rashes, conjunctivitis, muscle and joint pain or headache. These symptoms normally last for 2-7 days.

While countries in the Caribbean are worst hit by the disease, a large number of cases have been reported from South and Central America.

Source: http://www.firstpost.com/india/zika-virus-reaches-india-who-confirms-3-cases-in-ahmedabad-3488985.html

iMedWorks Ask Platform Links below:

1. Get a Medical Second Opinion
2. Search doctors and Request Appointment

Organ donation up 4-fold in India, but still a long way to go

/0 Comments/in /by

Of the 85,000 liver failure patients who join the country’s wait list annually, less than 3% get an organ. Also, of the two lakh fresh annual registrations for kidneys, 8,000 manage a transplant. Thousands waiting for heart or lungs face bigger odds as barely 1% get an organ before time runs out.

Despite cadaveric organ donations witnessing a near fourfold increase in the last five years, the demand-supply disparity in the country remains grave.Over 2.5 lakh deaths in India are attributed to organ failure annually, while cadaver donations are still very few in comparison. India’s organ donation rate in 2016 stood at an abysmal 0.8 persons per million population compared to Spain’s 36 per million, Croatia’s 32 per million or US’s 26 per million.

Experts say the gap exists because only ten states and two UTs have an active donation and transplant programme.States such as UP , Chhattisgarh, Himachal Pradesh, Goa and the North-East are yet to make a debut. Stakeholders blame lack of awareness, infra and political will as well as myths and misconceptions for the sluggish pace of cadaver donation.

” Even after decades, the programme is a non-starter because of systemic complexities.The problem lies within hospitals and is not so much about people’s acceptance any more. Police formalities remain difficult and time-consuming, discouraging people from donating,” says Dr Sunil Shroff of Chennaibased Mohan Foundation. “

There have been cases where people have approached us wanting to donate organs but either the hospital or the city lacked the infrastructure to retrieve organs,” he says, underlining how in a country with an acute shortage, organs get wasted.

Tamil Nadu, Maharashtra, Kerala, Karnataka, Telengana and Gujarat currently lead the way. Delhi and Chandigarh too managed 30 donations in 2016.

Dr Vimal Bhandari, director of the National Organ and Tissue Transplant Organisation, says the government is aware of the crisis. “We have signed an MoU with Spain which has the world’s highest donation rate. About 100 countries are learning their model. Their experts will train five of our regional coordination centres,” he says, adding that Spain took 30 years to build its programme.Unlike Spain, where majority of brain deaths occur due to haemorrhage, in India, road accidents are the main killer.

India’s infrastructure too is growing. The national network facilitated 136 instances of organ sharing between cities and e states. “Last year, we even saved the lives of two foreigners who underwent heart transplants here,” Dr Bhandari says.e Tamil Nadu runs India’s g most successful programme by e taking a slew of decisions to ea se donations about a decade , back; families donating organs a don’t have to move for NOCs or post-mortems. Also, the state offers free kidney , liver and heart transplants in government hospitals like developed nations.

Maharashtra, that crossed 100 cadaver donations last year despite one of Mumbai ‘s top hospitals being involved in a kid ney racket, has carried out 1,064 transplants in the last five years. Pune has suddenly emerged as a high-donation centre, surpassing Mumbai. “Till April 2017, 69 donations took place in Maharashtra,” said Dr Gauri Rathod, Maharashtra’s nodal officer for organ donation.
Hyderabad and other districts of Telangana have crossed over 1,000 organ donations since 2013. From less than 1 per million population, the donation rate has now reached 4.4.From just 41 being recorded in 2013 to 106 organ donations in 2016. In 2017, over 80 organ donations have already been reported. “But there is an urgent need for education among doctors. In many cases, doctors are uncomfortable in declaring brain death. This is true of government hospitals,” says Dr G Swarnalatha, in-charge Jeevandan.

Karnataka, too, is charting its own success story with donations taking a leap from 18 in 2013 to 70 in 2016. Dr Kishore Phadke, convener at Jeevasarthakathe–the state organ transplant authority–attributes this to linked Aadhaar cards with pledging organs. ” Anyone who enrols for Aadhaar will be directed to the website of Jeevasarthakathe where they can pledge organs,” he says.

However, many states face unique problems. Consider Kerala which has recorded only 11 donations after 73 in 2016. “A doctor filed a PIL in the high court alleging hospitals are falsely declaring brain deaths to procure organs. It led to negative propaganda in the social media.Even government authorities didn’t stand by the transplant doctors,” says Dr Jose Chacko Periappuram of Lisie Hospital in Kochi. Kerala, however, has to its credit some of the unique organ transplants that include larynx, pancreas, small intestine and hand transplants.

Eastern India is the worst, with most states not having conducted cadaver donations at all.Only seven cadaver donations, including five in 2016, took place in West Bengal since 2012. According to Aditi Kishore Sarkar, state’s nodal officer for cadaver donation, “The drive to popularize organ donation through donor card distribution has failed.In 2017, there has not been a single cadaver organ transplant so far.” The state plans to introduce new laws to improve brain death screening.
Even states like Karnataka show a unhealthy skew . As Dr H Sudarshan Ballal, senior nephrologist and chairman at Manipal Hospitals, Bengaluru, says, “Of more than 300 transplants conducted by private hospitals, only 20% are cadaver organ transplants.” He says India needs more retrieval centres. “India’s largest centre of neuroscience, NIMHANS, is still not recognized as a retrieval centre.”


Source: http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/life-style/health-fitness/health-news/organ-donation-up-4-fold-in-india-but-still-a-long-way-to-go/articleshow/59861347.cms

iMedWorks Ask Platform Links below:

1. Get a Medical Second Opinion
2. Search doctors and Request Appointment

Prostate Cancer – Most common among males in India

/0 Comments/in /by

Prostate cancer is a cancer of the small, walnut-shaped gland near the urinary bladder in men, that produces seminal fluid, nourishes and transports the sperm. Located in front of the rectum and just below the bladder, where the urine is stored, the prostate also surrounds the urethra, the canal through which urine passes out of the body. Older men, usually in the sixth decade of their life, are at a higher risk of this disease.Symptoms

At the early stages of this cancer, most men will not experience any symptoms. Some men, however, will experience the following symptoms that might indicate the presence of prostate cancer:

  • Frequent urination, especially at night
  • Difficulty in starting urination or holding back urine
  • Weak or interrupted flow of urine
  • Painful or burning urination
  • Difficulty in having an erection
  • Painful ejaculation
  • Blood in urine or semen
  • Frequent pain or stiffness in the lower back, hip or upper thigh

Causes

The exact cause of prostate cancer is under investigation. However, increasing age and high testosterone are known risk factors.Diagnosis

Since the above mentioned symptoms can potentially indicate the presence of other diseases or disorders, men who experience any of these symptoms should undergo a thorough check-up to determine the underlying cause of the symptoms.

  • A blood test for a protein known as Prostate Specific Antigen (PSA)
  • An ultrasound examination through the rectum is suggested, usually after the doctor has examined the prostate through the rectum (Digital Rectal Examination – DRE)

Treatment

The prostate cancer treatment options depend on several factors, such as:

  • How fast the cancer is growing
  • How much it has spread
  • The overall health
  • The benefits and the potential side effects of the treatment

Immediate treatment may not be necessary
For men diagnosed with a very early stage of prostate cancer, treatment may not be necessary right away. Some men may never need treatment. Instead, doctors sometimes recommend active surveillance.

In active surveillance, regular follow-up blood tests, rectal exams and possibly biopsies may be performed to monitor progression of your cancer. If tests show that cancer is progressing, then the doctor recommends surgery or radiation.

Active surveillance carries a risk that the cancer may grow and spread between checkups, making it less likely to be cured.

Radiation therapy
Radiation therapy uses high-powered energy to kill cancer cells. Prostate cancer radiation therapy can be delivered in two ways:

External beam radiation: During external beam radiation therapy, the patient lies on a table while a machine moves around the body, directing high-powered energy beams to the cancer. The patient undergoes external beam radiation treatments five days a week for several weeks. External beam radiation uses x-rays or protons to deliver the radiation.

Brachytherapy: Brachytherapy involves placing many rice-sized radioactive seeds in the prostate tissue. The radioactive seeds deliver a low dose of radiation over a long period of time. The doctor implants the radioactive seeds in the prostate using a needle guided by ultrasound images. The implanted seeds eventually stop giving off radiation and don’t need to be removed.

Hormone therapy
Hormone therapy is treatment to stop the body from producing the male hormone testosterone. Prostate cancer cells rely on testosterone to help them grow. Cutting off the supply of hormones may cause cancer cells to die or to grow more slowly. Hormone therapy options include:

  • Medications that stop the body from producing testosterone
  • Medications that block testosterone from reaching cancer cells
  • Surgery to remove the testicles (orchiectomy)

Hormone therapy is used in men with advanced prostate cancer to shrink the cancer and slow the growth of tumours. In men with early-stage prostate cancer, hormone therapy may be used to shrink tumours before radiation therapy. This can make it more likely that radiation therapy will be successful.

Hormone therapy is sometimes used after surgery or radiation therapy to slow the growth of any cancer cells left behind.

Surgery to remove the prostate
Surgery for prostate cancer involves removing the prostate gland, some surrounding tissue and a few lymph nodes. Ways the radical prostatectomy procedure can be performed include:

  • Using a robot to assist with surgery
  • Making an incision in your abdomen
  • Making an incision between your anus and scrotum
  • Laparoscopic prostatectomy

Freezing prostate tissue
Cryosurgery or cryoablation involves freezing tissue to kill cancer cells. During cryosurgery for prostate cancer, small needles are inserted in the prostate using ultrasound images as guidance. A very cold gas is placed in the needles, which causes the surrounding tissue to freeze. A second gas is then placed in the needles to reheat the tissue. The cycles of freezing and thawing kill the cancer cells and some surrounding healthy tissue.

Chemotherapy
Chemotherapy uses drugs to kill rapidly growing cells, including cancer cells. Chemotherapy can be administered through a vein in your arm, in pill form or both.

Chemotherapy may be a treatment option for men with prostate cancer that has spread to distant areas of their bodies. Chemotherapy may also be an option for cancers that don’t respond to hormone therapy.

Multiple new chemotherapy drugs have recently been approved for treatment of progressive, metastatic prostate cancer.

Immunotherapy
A form of immunotherapy has been developed to treat advanced, recurrent prostate cancer. This treatment takes some of the patient’s own immune cells, genetically engineers them to fight prostate cancer, and then injects the cells back into the patient’s body through a vein. Some men do respond to this therapy with some improvement in their cancer, but the treatment is very expensive and requires multiple visits.

Management
Depending on the stage of the disease, hormonal therapy, surgery and/or radiation therapy are initiated. Some patients may require chemotherapy at a later stage.

Specialists:

Dr Belliappa – Radiation Oncology (View Profile)

Dr Jagannath Dixit – Surgical Oncology (View Profile)

Dr Kumaraswamy – Radiation Oncology (View Profile)

Dr Mahesh Bandemegal – Surgical Oncology (View Profile)

Dr Nalini Rao – Radiation Oncology (View Profile)

Dr Radheshyam Naik – Bone Marrow Transplantation (View Profile)

Dr Ram Alwa – Radiation Oncology (View Profile)

Dr Ramesh Billimagga – Radiation Oncology (View Profile)

Dr Ravi B Diwakar – Medical Oncology (View Profile)

Dr S Bhattacharjee – Radiation Oncology (View Profile)

Dr Shekhar Patil – Medical Oncology (View Profile)

Dr Sridhar P S – Radiation Oncology (View Profile)

Dr Vijay Agarwal – Medical Oncology (View Profile)

Dr Vinayak Maka – Medical Oncology(View Profile) 

iMedWorks Ask Platform Links below:

1. Get a Medical Second Opinion
2. Search doctors and Request Appointment

64 percent of antibiotics being sold in India haven’t been regulated: UK study

/0 Comments/in /by

According to a study conducted in the UK, millions of antibiotics currently being sold in Indian markets haven’t been approved by the regulator.

64 percent antibiotic medicines that can be found at pharmacies around the country haven’t been regulated, the study said.

Despite pledging to tackle the rising problem of antibiotic resistance, multinational companies continued to manufacture many unapproved formulations, it was found.

Antibiotic resistance is slowly gaining momentum as a global crisis. It occurs when bacteria change in a way that reduces the effectiveness of drugs, chemicals, or other agents designed to cure or prevent infections.

As it becomes increasingly prevalent, it also threatens to undermine healthcare systems across the globe.

These findings, therefore, underline grave obstacles to bring antimicrobial resistance under control in India – a country which has one of the highest antibiotic consumption rates and sales in the world.

Parliamentary investigations into failures of the country’s drug regulatory system have also been previously carried out.

For the study published in the British Journal of Clinical Pharmacology, researchers analyzed figures for fixed dose combination (FDC) antibiotics (formulations composed of two or more drugs in a single pill) and single drug formulation (SDF) antibiotics (composed of a single drug) on the market in India.

Despite the sale of unapproved new medicines being illegal in India, it was found that of 118 different formulations of FDCs being sold in the country between 2007 and 2012, 64 percent (75) were not approved by the national drugs regulator, the Central Drugs Standard Control Organisation (CDSCO). Only five of the formulations were approved in the UK or US.

Source: http://zeenews.india.com/health/64-percent-of-antibiotics-being-sold-in-india-havent-been-regulated-uk-study-2078828

iMedWorks Ask Platform Links below:

1. Get a Medical Second Opinion
2. Search doctors and Request Appointment

India’s Digital Health Initiative to Be Adopted by WHO

/0 Comments/in /by

The World Health Organization (WHO) has considered to adopt India’s digital health initiative as its first resolution on digital health, said Health and Family Welfare Minister J.P. Nadda.
“I am happy to note that this assembly will be considering and adopting the first WHO resolution on digital health initiative by India,” said Nadda in his address at the World Health Assembly, the decision-making body of WHO. “Digital health technology have a huge potential for supporting Universal Health Coverage (UHC) and improving accessibility, quality and affordability of health services. This is a resolution which should be owned by all of us so as to pave the path for a forward looking global health agenda,” he said.
The 71st World Health Assembly is being attended by delegations from all WHO member states.

Nadda said India is planning to host a Global Digital Health Summit in near future with the support of WHO and hopes it would contribute to WHO’s efforts to come up with a comprehensive global health strategy on digital health.

Stating that UHC is one of the most powerful social equalizers, he said: “India today is firmly committed to achieving UHC as articulated in its National Health Policy 2017. Our successes in sustaining polio free status and substantially achieving the MDGs have infused renewed enthusiasm to meet the ambitious SDGs and its underlining commitment of ‘Leave no one behind’.”

India has fast tracked many initiatives aimed at achieving all the four tenets of UHC that is strengthening health systems, improving access to free medicines and diagnostics and reducing catastrophic healthcare spending, he added.

“To translate our vision of UHC, our Prime Minister Narendra Modi has launched an ambitious programme called ‘Ayushman Bharat’ that is ‘Long Live India’. The programme rests on the twin pillars of health and wellness centers for provision of comprehensive healthcare services and the Prime Ministers’ National Health Protection Mission (NHPM),” said the minister.

NHPM is aimed at providing secondary and tertiary healthcare to 100 million families covering 500 million individuals, about 40 per cent of the country’s population, who will be provided an insurance cover of Rs 500,000 per year.

Nadda also talked on steps taken to reduce non-communicable diseases and India’s commitment to end tuberculosis by 2025, five years ahead of WHO’s deadline for member states.

“India is deeply committed to play a pivotal role to ensure access and affordability of medicines,” he added.

Following the overwhelming response at the first World Conference on Access to Medical Products in November 2017, India is organizing the second World Conference in October 2018 in New Delhi, he added.


Source: https://www.medindia.net/news/indias-digital-health-initiative-to-adopted-by-who-179618-1.htm

(Picture for representation)

iMedWorks Ask Platform Links below:

1. Get a Medical Second Opinion
2. Search doctors and Request Appointment

INDIA: A Second Opinion!!

/0 Comments/in /by

“Over the years, I’ve covered a lot of territory for The Washington Post, but it’s a book project that brings me to India, a book on how other countries deliver health care,” says veteran reporter T.R. Reid, as he begins his FRONTLINE/World report on Ayurveda, a form of medicine that has been practiced in India for three thousand years.

The 60-something Reid also has a personal stake in the matter — a bum shoulder that has been bothering him for 25 years since he injured it in an accident in the Navy.

Reid, who is also known for his humorous commentaries on National Public Radio, travels to the Arya Vaidya Pharmacy, or AVP, in Coimbatore in southern India to see if he can alleviate his aches and pains and avoid the high-tech shoulder surgery that his physician back home in Denver has recommended.

“On first impression, this place looks more like a spa than a hospital,” says Reid as he strolls around the AVP garden, “but I’ve heard the doctors here know their stuff, especially on chronic illness — you know, migraines, back pain, arthritis — the kind of ailments that we in the West can’t seem to fix.”

“This is the failure of Western medicine,” Dr. Ram Manohar, AVP research chief, tells Reid, “because it knows to cure, but it does not know how to heal.”

Reid’s treatment begins with a ceremony at AVP’s temple, where he seeks the blessing of Dhanwantari, the Hindu god of healing. Is this perhaps all part of a placebo effect? Reid wonders. But Dr. Manohar tells him that’s all right: “The placebo effect, I think, is very essential for our medicines to work. Ayurveda believes that healing has to be initiated from the psyche, the mind of the patient. And we use all techniques as much as we can, including religious.”

Next step: Reid meets the chief healer, Medical Director K.G. Raveendran, who consults with him and takes his pulse — at great length — as if he were hearing all the inner disturbances of the body. At last, Dr. Raveendran pronounces his diagnosis: “Pitta, Kapha.”

This pronouncement is based on the ancient Ayurvedic principle that all living things are controlled by three vital forces, or “doshas” — Vata, Pitta, and Kapha. Good health comes from keeping the doshas in balance. As Reid puts it, “When they get out of equilibrium, we get sick. In my case, I have too much Pitta and Kapha, leaving my Vata out of whack.”

What follows is a two-and-a-half-week regimen of oily massages, bitter brews, mudpacks and caustic eye drops. Confiding to his “digital diary” video camera, Reid alternates between skepticism and acceptance as he submits to the treatments — all except the leeches, that is. Those he merely observes at work on another patient.

But can Ayurvedic medicine really cure? Researcher Ram Manohar is prepared to find out. In collaboration with the UCLA Medical School, he’s begun a long-term study to see which works better for rheumatoid arthritis, Ayurveda or the Western drug methotrexate.

“A person like me, I mean, we would like to ultimately understand what really is there in Ayurveda,” says Dr. Manohar. “I mean, we just cannot continue to be mystical about these things. We would really like to demystify the whole process, bring in some transparency, and we feel that if it is found to be not useful, then it will also be a good service.”

At times cranky and sarcastic, Reid nevertheless admits that early mornings at the clinic are magical, and by the end of his stay, he discovers that he has less pain and more movement in his shoulder. The Ayurvedic practitioners tell him to continue the treatments when he returns home to Colorado, and Reid thanks them for their efforts.

Before leaving India, he makes one last stop: Rishikesh, far to the north, the home of the sages, or rishis, and the birthplace of Ayurveda. Pilgrims in the millions come here to perform Hindu rituals in the sacred Ganges, floating candles on the water at night.

Skeptical to begin with, Reid is now convinced that Ayurveda is “on to something,” though it may be hard to prove by Western standards. Perhaps Ram Manohar’s UCLA study will soon provide some answers.

Back home, in a brief epilogue, Reid admits that whatever gains he made in India have faded away. His shoulder is as stiff as ever. “But that’s not the fault of Ayurvedic medicine; let’s be fair here,” says Reid. “It’s because I haven’t done a darned thing about my arm since I left India.” Still, he has decided to skip the surgery that would have implanted a titanium rod in his arm.

“I’m certain that if I did the kind of massage or any kind of exercise like they gave me, even if I took those awful herbal medicines regularly, that my arm would be making significant progress, because we sure did when I was in India,” declares Reid, “and for that I’m grateful to Ayurveda.”

Source: https://www.pbs.org/frontlineworld/stories/india701/video/video_index.html

iMedWorks Ask Platform Links below:

1.  Get a Medical Second Opinion
2.  Search doctors and Request Appointment