Experts warns increasing heart disease among Indians in Kuwait
IIK Staff Reporter; Photo: Gafoor Moodady
Sunday, November 23, 2014
Unhealthy food habits, lack of physical exercise and stress of being away from home country contributes to the rise in the incidence of heart attacks among Indians living in Kuwait, panel of expert doctors said during the seminar organized by the Indian Embassy in collaboration with the Indian Doctors Forum, Kuwait at the Embassy auditorium.
The recent increase in the number of deaths of Indian nationals in the country, the majority are caused by heart attacks, prompted the Indian embassy to organize the awareness seminar, which was attend by the community members. Panel of Doctors including Dr CG Suresh, Senior Consultant, Mubarak Al-Kabeer Hospital, Dr Vinod Warrier MD, Dept of Internal Medicine, Mubarak Al-Kabeer Hospital and Dr Jatinder Dhawan, Consultant Cardiologist at New Mowasat Hospital spoke on the risk factors responsible for heart attacks. “Unless you modify your lifestyle and modify the risk factors that are responsible for heart attacks, you are not going to escape it,” Dr C G Suresh warned community members that heart attacks are alarmingly rising among Indians.
42.5 percent of the Indians who died here this year are due to heart attack. 177 people died of heart attacks, said HE Sunil Jain, the Indian Ambassador to Kuwait while inaugurating the seminar. Indian Doctors Forum president Dr Vinod Grover presided the function. IDF is ready to help in generating awareness among the community members, he said.
Fast food culture in this region contributes largely to this phenomenon. However since we have well-equipped facilities with modern facilities for treating heart patients here in Kuwait, if the patients arrive in hospital on time, the survival chances are 99.5 percent, Dr Suresh said. He said that with the help of public education and proper awareness, we can reduce the risk of getting heart disease.
Dr Warrier presented a paper on ‘Heart Attack: Why We should Worry’ during the seminar, which was very useful for the community. Family history, gender and age also contributes to teh risk factor, which we don’t have much control, while factors such as hyperlipidemia, smoking, hypertension, diabetes, obesity, faulty diet and lack of exercise can be taken care of easily with proper control, he said.
Dr Jatinder Dhawan, Consultant Cardiologist at New Mowasat Hospital, also participated in the seminar and answered queries from the community members. Dr Vivek B Wani, IDF Vice-President also attended the seminar.
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