Heart diseases to be prevented through IT

LAHORE:The National Information Technology Board (NITB) and Pakistan Society of Interventional Cardiology (PSIC) have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) on prevention and treatment of cardiovascular diseases.

NITB CEO Dr Babar Majid Bhatti, PSIC President Prof Dr Zubair Akram and Vice President Prof Dr Nauman Naseer signed the MoU in the presence of Caretaker Federal Minister for IT and Telecommunication Dr Umar Saif. NITB DG Sohail Khan and other officials from both sides were also present on this occasion.

According to MoU, the NITB, an organisation of the Ministry of IT and Telecommunication, will provide digital and technical support to the PSIC for data preparation and research for the prevention of heart diseases and the treatment of heart attack diseases.

Addressing on the occasion, Dr Umar Saif said that the world has rapidly adopted technology and digitised health, education, including minor to important sectors, although we are far behind in this process, such measures are necessary to connect ourselves with the digital world. He said that timely access to all the required information for patients and prevention of heart diseases will help in saving precious human lives. In this regard, the Ministry of IT will provide all possible support and assistance. “The purpose of this MoU is to explore mutual areas of collaboration to discover how information technology can be leveraged to improve and support the national heart attack treatment initiative.”

He added that this MoU will help a lot in developing new databases or apps and improvement of existing databases or apps for evaluation and analysis of STEMI/heart attack patients; developing national protocols and guidelines to standardise care for all hospitals participating in STEMI/ACS care; developing a network recognising hospitals that can provide PPCI and those that can provide lytic therapy and establishing a referral system for pharmacoinvasive therapy, he informed.

Ambulance and patient awareness programmes for the patients to act in case of heart attack will be conducted. It will help equipping ambulances with ECG smartphone transmission to the nearest recognised capable health centre so STEMI alert can be activated.

Earlier, Dr Babar Majid Bhatti and Dr Zubair Akram briefed the federal minister on the implications of the MoU and said that the cooperation would help in the completion of the project to develop national networks and databases to help in the timely treatment of patients suffering from heart attack. He said that this agreement will be very helpful for the prevention of primary and secondary heart attack. Social media campaign regarding heart attack symptoms, treatment and preventive strategies will be launched for the awareness of masses.