Asian Heart Proudly showcases its 100-member Fit2Run Hearts – cardiac patients turned marathon runners.

Asian Heart Proudly showcases its 100-member Fit2Run Hearts – cardiac patients turned marathon runners.

Asian Heart Institute, medical partner to The Standard Chartered Mumbai Marathon for the eleventh consecutive year showcased its 100 member Fit2Run Hearts – a community of individuals who’ve benefitted immensely from Asian Hearts’ Preventive Cardiology & Cardiac Rehab, after being treated for various heart ailments, here in Mumbai today, at Bandra Kurla Complex.

Individually called Heart Ambassadors, the Fit2Run team comprises recovered cardiac patients, who are running the marathon-after  angioplasty, bypass with multiple grafts or even pure medical management via cardiac rehabilitation. From age 25 to 85, these runners are an example for the rest of the city and country- as evangelists of healthy hearts, and will reach out to other cardiac patients across the country as torchbearers of hope, faith and discipline.

Speaking to his braveheart cardiac patients –turned marathon runner team, Dr. Ramakanta Panda, Vice Chairman and Managing Director of Asian Heart Institute proudly shared, “Life does not end at being diagnosed with a heart disease. Rather, it marks the beginning of a fitter and better life.”

Its interesting to note that probably for the first time in the history of marathon, the pacers (the expert runners/leaders who set the pace for the rest of the runners) themselves are past heart patients-.

On a lighter note, Dr.Panda added that his  ‘Heart Ambassadors’ were fitter than him and he was going to stay far away from them.

Renowned journalist and marathoner, Kumar Ketkar humbly admitted, “I’m proud as well as embarrassed to admit that, not only would I never go to any gym, but I would mock those who would. I was accidentally detected with four blockages. It was during a routine check-up that our office organizes that there were problems in my ECG. I just happened to mention of it to Dr Panda who I knew. There were no obvious signs of tiredness or exhaustion as such. But when Dr Panda saw my case, he got me admitted immediately and within two days I was operated on. My personal message to everyone is: There are these fears of heart ailments; about running for the marathon, about many other issues, but those fears are completely baseless. It is essentially a reflection of a lazy mind and an indifferent approach towards one’s own health. This marathon and Asian Heart Centre’s cardiac rehab encourages everyone to lead a happy and positive life.

Dr. Aashish Contractor, the HOD for Preventive Cardiology & Cardiac Rehab, shared the statistics. “This is the largest contingency of runners we’ve had so far. A total of 100! 26 of them are doing the half marathon; 13 running for the first time, and one full marathoner. Our ‘Heart Ambassadors’ all gung ho about running the marathon.” 

ASIAN HEARTS MARATHON INFRASTRUCTURE

The Asian Heart Institute has been the preferred Medical Partner for the Mumbai Marathon for the past eleven years in succession. As the Mumbai Marathon draws closer, a dedicated team at the Asian Heart Institute is gearing up for the grand event to be held on January 19, 2014.

The whole team at AHI is more than glad to contribute state-of-the-art facilities and services for the marathoners. This will include:

•         350+ volunteers from AHI (including 200+ medical staff)

•         8 ambulances (each with a doctor & a nurse to ply on the entire route)

•         6 ‘mobile medics’ (doctors on motorbikes for the entire route)

•         10 aid stations all along the route

•         2 base camps (of 40 & 20 beds each)

With all this medical infrastructure in place, Asian Heart Institute can aptly handle any kind of medical emergency -- injuries, dehydration, or any other complication arising due to long distance running.

ABOUT ASIAN HEART

Asian Heart Institute (AHI) has been set up with an aim to provide world-class cardiac care in India. Set up in 2002,  Internationally accredited with ISO 9001:2000, JCI & NIAHO, AHI reaffirms its commitment towards world class cardiac care by being the India's Highest Accredited Hospital.

ABOUT RAMAKANTA PANDA

Dr Ramakanta Panda is the vice chairman & managing director of Asian Heart Institute, Mumbai.

He has performed over 17000 operations, including 1000 redo operations & over 2500 complex high risk operations. He has pioneered many techniques including total arterial grafting, operating on severely impaired heart & redo operations. He is considered one of the safest heart surgeon in the world with an operative mortality of less than 0.5% for last 9 years. He did a complex redo bypass surgery on Prime minister of India Dr. Manmohan Singh.

He has been awarded the 3rd highest national award, Padmabhusan. He is also awarded a Doctorate in Science by his alma mater Utkal University.