BENGALURU: Food and Civil Supplies Minister Dinesh Gundu Rao on Sunday inaugurated a free heart screening programme organised by Manipal Hospitals. The hospital entered the ‘India/Asian Book of Records’ for screening as many as 10, 879 people across its units on account of World Heart Day.
The day is observed on the last Sunday of September each year.
Dinesh Gundu Rao congratulated Manipal on the gesture and said, “It is definitely a massive campaign, which has seen an overwhelming response from the people, who are part of this success. This only proves that if you take care of yourself, your heart will take care of you.”
The screening was conducted across Manipal Hospitals units in Bengaluru, Goa, Jaipur, Salem, Vijayawada, Vishakhapatnam and Mangaluru.
Bengaluru witnessed 3,500 people from across ages and genders visiting the camps and taking a pledge to keep their hearts healthy. The event also saw talks by cardiac specialists, interaction with doctors to address general queries, free blood pressure and BMI checkups.
“We want people to mark this day in their calendars for regular heart checkups. The phenomenal turnout across units highlights the fact that people don’t mind treading a few miles extra to save their hearts. Cases of cardiac arrest have become a common occurrence due to sedentary lifestyle, bad eating habits, erratic work schedules and lack of physical activity, thus we are taking positive steps in this direction for people to adopt preventive measures through this campaign,” Dr Sudarshan Ballal, Medical Director & Chairman - Medical Advisory Board, Manipal Health, said.
“Heart ailment-related facts are alarming. People between 30 and 50 years die every minute in India due to cardiac arrest. Habits like smoking and drinking must be cut down to lower the risk of stroke as they apart from unhealthy eating are the prime culprits behind strokes. Today, we are happy to bring about preventive awareness among people through free screenings,” he said.