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Dr. Atul Prabhu examines a patient at the ‘free heart disease check up camp,’ in Dimapur on Saturday.[/caption]
Dimapur, Dec. 15: A free ‘heart disease check up camp’ organised by the Rotary Club of Dimapur, of the group’s ‘Heart to Heart Project’ for children with congenital heart disease, was held in the club’s office premise, on Sat. Dec. 15 in Dimapur.
Dr. Atul Prabhu, deputy director and paediatric cardiologist at Sri Sathya Sai Sanjeevani Hospital in Raipur conducted the camp. He was accompanied by PDG Ashok Kumar Agarwal, and PDG Shashi Varvandkar.
Rotary Club partnered with Sri Sathya Sai Sanjeevani Hospital for this initiative. During the past 10 years, the initiative is said to have helped 60 children receive free congenital heart defect corrective surgery for free, which otherwise would have cost lakh of rupees.
The club’s chairperson Pradip Jain interacted with the media persons at the camp. He said that the club organises such camps time to time. ‘And this was a yearlong initiative and people who need help can approach them in their office and accordingly the club will make arrangements,’ he said.
Jain clarified that although the surgeries are done free, patients and families need to bear travelling expenditure. It is only in exceptional cases when the patients’ families cannot afford the expenditure that the club gets involved, it was informed.
Also, Varvandkar mentioned that not only the patients are treated in the hospital for free, those who accompany the patients are also provided with free food and lodging at the Sri Sathya Sai Sanjeevani Hospital, which is run on charity.
“It is God and we are just the instruments,” Varvandkar said, dismissing the notion that they might be doing ‘anything great’ for the needy but that they were only acting as an instrument of God in their capability.
