Andhra Pradesh

CARE forms team to treat heart disorders

HYDERABAD: CARE Hospitals at Banjara Hills has formed a dedicated team of cardiologists for providing prompt treatment to patients suffering from serious heart rhythm disorder--sustained ventricular tachycardia (VT)-- which could at times prove fatal and cause sudden death.

At a press conference here on Friday, G.Narasimhan, B.K.S. Sastry and other cardiologists said that in spite of undergoing a bypass surgery, VT usually occurs in five per cent of patients. VT is the condition in which consecutive impulses arise from the ventricles at a heart rate of 100 beats or more per minute until stopped by drug treatment or electrical shock. It was dangerous because it could degenerate further into a totally disorganised electrical activity called ventricular fibrillation with the heart not contracting and failing to pump the blood.

They said that VT also occurs in patients who do not suffer heart attacks and their numbers were on the rise in the country.

The disorder is being mostly treated by a procedure called catheter ablation since implanting a defibrillator would be expensive and beyond the reach of most patients.

Apart from VT, the team would also treat other cardiac rhythm disorders.

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