Governments should prioritise healthcare

KOCHI: Governments must prioritise their spending on healthcare to make use of the best available medical services, said cardiologist and former presidential candidate of Macedonia, Dr Sasko Kedev. The doctor, who climbed the Mount Everest in 2009, was in the city to inaugurate the annual meeting of the National Interventional Council. Kedev said that governments must come forward to improve the reach of medical services like angioplasty to the larger population. “This is a treatment through which we can actually add to the number of days a person can live healthily. In the case of drugs we can reduce on the morbidity, but not on the mortality. This is a treatment that can directly produce results in the form of longer life spans and the results are concrete and immediate,” he said, lauding the benefits of angioplasty.“In Europe, there is an initiative called ‘Stent for a life’in which the governments help in funding the patients for treatments like angioplasty,” he said. Kedev said that all over the world, there was a growing phenomenon wherein classical surgeries like bypass were being replaced by interventional techniques.“Since it does not involve the tearing up of body, it’s much more convenient for the patients. They can start functioning on the same day. So globally there is a preference for interventional cardiological procedures which is reflected in India also,” he felt. Kedev also said that treatments like bypass can be carried out only in the cases of patients with stable bodies. In cases of acute infarction, interventional techniques are the only way to go.Talking about the new strides in the field of interventional cardiology, the doctor said that it now has the scope to replace several conventional medical techniques.“Under the latest technological interventions one can replace a valve without a surgery. Another area where interventional techniques is showing very positive results is the field of resistant hypertension. Under a new finding it can be cured through the ablation of renal nerves,” he said.