Needy Heart Foundation Completes 1000 Heart Surgeries

The NGO Needy Heart Foundation (NHF) has just completed 1000 heart surgeries in eight years. The NGO Needy Heart Foundation is an an initiative of the current NHF chairman O P Khanna, consultant cardiothoracic surgeon of Manipal Heart Institute Joseph Xavier and consultant cardiovascular surgeon of Wockhardt Hospitals,Bangalore Dr N S Devananda.

The NGO last week celebrated this successful milestone while organising`Keep The Beat' on Sunday at The Leela Palace for patients, their families, donors and doctors from partner hospitals.Giving a breakdown on the number of surgeries performed, The NHF chairman said that out of one thousand heart surgeries that has been performed so far, 506 were children and 57 senior citizens.

The NHF has been leading by example for the last few years by treating patients from the lower socio economical background with an objective of preventing finance from being a hurdle in the treatment process.The trusts vision is to eliminate deaths due to heart disease, for lack of money or knowledge.

While the Needy Heart Foundation has been supporting patients from across the country,a majority of them are from Karnataka and neighbouring states.

Over 1.4 million Indians need critical heart surgery annually. Currently about 55,000 surgeries are done, largely because the rest cannot afford it. They die a slow painful death.More than 1,50,000 Indian children are born with congenital heart disease. Only about 5,000 manage to get treated mostly with sponsorships and government aid while the rest are left to die untreated and unheeded.

"We hold our meetings at our partner hospitals at Manipal, Wockhardt Hospitals and Jayadeva Institute of Cardiology. With the support of hospital staff, management and through our website, we coordinate with patients, doctors and donors," Xavier said. "And we don't have a corpus fund either."

He calls the journey a miracle and narrated his experience in working for NHF. "An autorickshaw driver found treatment for both his children. Now, he talks about us and the organization with most of his commuters."

Here is hoping that the Needy Heart Foundation reaches the next one thousand surgeries milestone very soon.

If anyone wish to donate to the NHF or wishes to know more about Needy Heart Foundation,You can check out their website at http://www.needyheartfoundation.org/index.html