New Delhi, September 23, 2006 - In line with the theme for this year's World Heart Day -- "How Young is Your Heart" -- GE Healthcare has a simple message for Delhites: "Be Proactive, Get the Facts".
According to Dr Harsh Mahajan, Director of Mahajan Imaging Centre, Delhi, "Coronary heart disease is the number one killer disease in India and the best way to manage it, is to treat it early through timely detection. With the Volume CT system installed at our centre, doctors can help patients prevent a heart attack and its consequent damaging effects which may even be fatal. Today, any one can walk into our Centre, get the heart scan done during a coffee break, confirm his heart health and go back to work. It is as simple as that."
Dr R K Mathur, Head of Department, Radiology, Batra Hospital & Medical Research Centre, Delhi, adds, "Learning you or someone you love has a serious heart condition can be very difficult. But today there's more hope than ever. By taking a proactive role in learning about the disease and the treatment options available, you can do more to fight heart disease than you may realize. An important first step is to get the heart examined to ascertain the facts about your present condition. This can be easily done using the very latest technology such as the LightSpeed Volume CT system installed at Batra Hospital. With this Volume CT system we can capture images of the heart in just five heart beats. More importantly, this is done non-invasively so you can literally have a check up and walk out almost immediately thereafter."
According to the World Health Organization, cardiovascular diseases, such as heart disease and stroke, are the leading cause of death globally, killing more than 17 million people in 2005. Each year, 3.8 million men and 3.4 million women worldwide die from coronary heart disease. Since 1990, more people have died from coronary heart disease than from any other cause.
In India, coronary heart disease is a major cause for concern. According to a recent global study on cardiac diseases by World Health Organization (WHO):
Mr. V. Raja, President & CEO, GE Healthcare South Asia said, "Perhaps the most beautiful word in the entire medical lexicon is "early." After all, "early" is optimal for diagnosis and treatment. And thanks to new advanced technologies like LightSpeed Volume CT available today, clinicians have the ability to diagnose disease earlier".
The LightSpeed VCT enables physicians to capture images of the heart and coronary arteries in just five heartbeats -- something no other CT system can offer. In a single rotation, the LightSpeed VCT creates 64 submillimeter images, totaling 40 millimeter of anatomical coverage, which may be combined to form a three-dimensional view of the patient's anatomy for physicians to analyze.
Installed at some of the premier hospitals in the country, the LightSpeed Volume CT system has transformed the way doctors are able to diagnose and treat heart disease and other life-threatening illnesses. It is breaking barriers in speed of diagnosis and accuracy, enabling doctors to diagnose and treat patients in the shortest time possible.
The LightSpeed Volume CT system has been installed at Jaslok Hospital and Hinduja Hospital in Mumbai; Batra Hospital and Medical Research Centre, Mahajan Imaging Centre and Fortis Healthcare in New Delhi; Bharat Scans and MIOT Hospital in Chennai; Manipal Hospital, Narayana Hrudnalaya, and BGS Hospital in Bangalore; Medical Trust Hospital in Kochi; Delta Heart Centre in Ludhiana; Okay Diagnostics in Jaipur; A J Shetty Hospital in Mangalore; KMCH Hospital in Coimbatore and Vijaya Diagnostic Centre in Vizag.
GE Healthcare provides transformational medical technologies that are shaping a new age of patient care. Our expertise in medical imaging and information technologies, medical diagnostics, patient monitoring systems, performance improvement solutions, drug discovery, and biopharmaceutical manufacturing technologies is helping clinicians around the world re-imagine new ways to predict, diagnose, inform and treat disease, so their patients can live their lives to the fullest.
GE Healthcare's broad range of products and services enable healthcare providers to better diagnose and treat cancer, heart disease, neurological diseases, and other conditions earlier. Our vision for the future is to enable a new "early health" model of care focused on earlier diagnosis, pre-symptomatic disease detection and disease prevention.
Headquartered in the United Kingdom, GE Healthcare is a $15 billion unit of General Electric Company (NYSE: GE). Worldwide, GE Healthcare employs more than 45,000 people committed to serving healthcare professionals and their patients in more than 100 countries. For more information about GE Healthcare, visit our website at www.gehealthcare.com.
Purnima SahniMohanty
GE Corporate Manager - Communications
[email protected]
+91-11-41555303