CHENNAI: In a proactive step that would spell relief for parents, particularly of children with birth defects, the Tamil Nadu government is planning to set up early intervention centres at the block level.
The expansion of these centres, now available at the district level, would mean easy access to the parents who come for therapeutic treatment. Experts say this would also help detect even more cases of down syndrome and other birth defects.
The centres set up by the health ministry under the Rashtriya Bal Swasthya Karyakram (Child Health Screening and Early Intervention Services) aim at early detection and management of the 4Ds prevalent in children - defects at birth, diseases in children, deficiency conditions and developmental delays.
The programme covers all children from newborn to 18 years of age.
Thanks to this facility at the district level, the authorities in Tamil Nadu could provide early intervention in as many as 900 down syndrome cases. After this success, the State has now proposed setting them up at the block level.
“Among the 10 lakh children born in Tamil Nadu between April 2015 and March 2016, 900 were diagnosed with down syndrome. Similarly, 573 children were diagnosed with the condition from April 2016 April to January 2017. Even more cases can be detected if there are block level early intervention centres,” said Dr J Kumutha, expert advisor for child health, Tamil Nadu.
With only one such facility in a district, parents of such children have to travel long distances for day-to-day therapy training. Some even miss therapeutic treatment because of this. It is here that the block level centres acn help these families. They are closer home and provide easy access, added officials.
“The government will discuss the proposal with the Union Health Ministry soon,” added Dr Kumutha.
A review was undertaken at Chennai, Madurai and Tiruchy centres to improve the functioning of these facilities, added officials.
There are 11-member teams at these district level centres who provide therapy training, genetic counselling and also do chromosomal anomalies test. The chromosomal test is done for parents and the baby who are high risk groups if the pregnant mother is above 35 years and had previous child with down syndrome. The cases were diagnosed after streamlining of the screening procedure in 2014.
World Down Syndrome Day is observed on March 21.