PUDUCHERRY: It’s her dedication and commitment towards individuals with haemophilia that helped Dr Nalini Parthasarathy, a former professor of paediatrics at JIPMER, bag the Padma Shri award.
She not only founded the haemophilia Society in Puducherry, but also has been serving the patients in Puducherry and the neigbouring districts in TN for over 30 years. “I presume it is the first Padma Shri Award for services for haemophilia. I dedicate the award to all haemophilia affected people in the country and the haemophilia societies,” said Nalini.
For Nalini, the work began while she was serving in JIPMER as professor, and later as HOD of Paediatrics. After serving them for 10 years in JIPMER, she decided to focus only on haemophilia patients, and took voluntary retirement from service at JIPMER. She founded the haemophilia Society of Puducherry and established a haemophilia Health Centre at Thattanchavady after the Chief Minister provided a land and Indian Oil Corporation chipped in to construct a building. Now the society is taking care of around 300 haemophilia patients in the centre. She herself has been contributing from her own earnings for meeting their requirements .
As the medication is very expensive with each drug costing around Rs 10,000, since it has to be imported, most patients are unable to afford them. “Now we are procuring the medicines through haemophilia society of India and providing them at JIPMER and Indira Gandhi Government General Hospital and Post graduate Institute at Puducherry and also at Karaikal,” said Nalini, who had been advocating the stocking of the medicines in all government hospitals and providing them free to patients.
For the education of haemophilia students, the society is providing scholarships and some have become doctors and engineers.